Profile
Dr. Gulam Hussain Syed is a Scientist-F at the Institute of Life Sciences in Bhubaneswar, India. He completed his Ph.D. at the University of Hyderabad, India, and pursued his postdoctoral studies at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), USA, in the School of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, for 3.5 years. Subsequently, he worked as a project scientist at UCSD for the next 4 years. During his tenure at UCSD, he characterized the molecular events in the lifecycle and pathophysiology of Hepatitis B and C viruses and showed how these viruses usurp cellular lipid metabolism and mitochondrial dynamics for viral dissemination and persistence. Dr. Syed was awarded the prestigious Wellcome Trust-DBT India Alliance Fellowship. Currently, his lab works on characterizing the Flaviviruses-Host interactions with focus on organelles like mitochondria, peroxisome, cytoskeletal system, and the intracellular trafficking network to identify therapeutic targets and strategies with specific and pan-flaviviral potential.
Current Focus Areas
• Currently the group is focussing on characterizing the virus-host interactions, and homeostasis of organelles like mitochondria, during flaviviral infection to decipher their role in viral lifecycle, host response, and disease pathogenesis. The major goal is to identify crucial host factors and signalling pathways to develop therapeutic interventions against Flaviviruses
• The group is also looking into cytoskeletal modifications and rearrangements that occur during flavivirus infection to characterize how flaviviruses exploit the host cytoskeletal system for viral dissemination to identify therapeutic targets with pan-flaviviral potential
• The group is also working towards deciphering the molecular mechanisms associated with virus-induced cytopathy, host antiviral and inflammatory signaling, to identify the molecular pathways that trigger host response and pave the way for the pathophysiology of disease.
• The group is utilizing high throughput platforms to screen for potential antiviral agents and repurpose approved drugs for flaviviral therapeutics.
Selected Publications
• Avula K, Singh B, Samantaray S, Syed GH. The Early Secretory Pathway Is Crucial for Multiple Aspects of the Hepatitis C Virus Life Cycle. J Virol. 2023 Jul 27;97(7):e0018023. https://doi: 10.1128/jvi.00180-23.
• Singh B, Avula K, Sufi SA, Parwin N, Das S, Alam MF, Samantaray S, Bankapalli L, Rani A, Poornima K, Prusty B, Mallick TP, Shaw SK, Dodia H, Kabi S, Pagad TT, Mohanty S, Syed GH. Defective Mitochondrial Quality Control during Dengue Infection Contributes to Disease Pathogenesis. J Virol. 2022 Oct 26;96(20):e0082822. https://doi: 10.1128/jvi.00828-22
• Agarwal A, Alam MF, Basu B, Pattanayak S, Asthana S, Syed GH*, Kalia M*, Vrati S*. Japanese Encephalitis Virus NS4A Protein Interacts with PTEN-Induced Kinase 1 (PINK1) and Promotes Mitophagy in Infected Cells. Microbiol Spectr. 2022 Jun 29;10(3):e0083022. https://doi:10.1128/spectrum.00830-22.
• Kumar, S., Singh, B., Kumari, P., Kumar, P. V., Agnihotri, G., Khan, S., Kant Beuria, T., Syed, G. H., & Dixit, A. (2021). Identification of multipotent drugs for COVID-19 therapeutics with the evaluation of their SARS-CoV2 inhibitory activity. Computational and structural biotechnology journal, 19, 1998–2017. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.csbj.2021.04.014
• Taraphdar D, Singh B, Pattanayak S, Kiran A, Kokavalla P, Alam MF, Syed GH. Comodulation of Dengue and Chikungunya Virus Infection During a Coinfection Scenario in Human Cell Lines. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2022 Apr 28;12:821061. https://doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2022.821061.