Mahesh

I am currently working as a senior scientist at Metahelix Life Sciences, a TATA enterprise, Bangalore, India. Metahelix is an biotechnology company
I have experience of working on the bacterial pathogen Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae (Xoo), E. coli, Bacillus thuringiensis and Pseudomonas. These experiences will help me in identifying PGPR/endophytic bacteria and characterizing their interaction with important plants.

I have 5 years of postdoctoral research at CCMB, Hyderabad. Here, I identified and characterized effector proteins which suppress the defense responses of rice. At CCMB, I used rice and Xanthomonas a model system and was involved in understanding the manner in which the bacterial pathogen, Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae (Xoo) suppresses rice defense responses and reduces growth and yield. I had been involved in identifying the role of 16 different Xoo type 3 secretion system secreted proteins and found that four of these proteins (namely XopN, XopQ, XopX, and XopZ) function in suppression of cell wall damage induced defense responses in rice (PLoS One, Sept 2013).
I did my PhD from CIMAP, Lucknow. The title of PhD work was ‘expression profiling of monoterpene synthesis pathway in Mentha piperita through ESTS and differentials for specific stages and tissues.
The key strengths that I possess for the success in this position are my experience in working with different strain of bacteria such as Xanthomonas, Strept