Profile
Ajay Kumar Mahato, MSc in Bioinformatics from Chaudhary Charan Singh University, began his career at ICAR-National Institute of Plant Biotechnology, New Delhi, leading bioinformatics efforts for international genome sequencing projects like the International Tomato Genome Sequencing Project and International Wheat Genome Sequencing Project. His contributions include decoding genomes of pigeonpea, jute, mango, coconut, Mesorhizobium cicero Ca181 and Magnaporthe oryzae. Completing his PhD at ICAR-National Institute of Plant Biotechnology, he developed the first 62K genic SNP genotyping chip for pigeonpea. Joining DBT-NGGF at NIPGR, New Delhi, in 2019, he established a high-throughput computational facility. As Staff Scientist-III at CDFD, he heads the Genome Informatics lab, focusing on genomics, bioinformatics, big data analysis, and ML/AI applications. His expertise spans plant disease resistance, genome decoding, population genomics, NGS-based DNA fingerprinting, genotyping assay development, genomic resource databases, web applications, and computational biology.
Current Focus Areas
1. Decoding and developing a reference-level genome of Indian native Manipur black rice and understanding its evolutionary path.
2. Genome-wide identification of disease resistance and defense response genes in the Amaranthus genome for varietal improvement in the rapidly changing climate
3. Developing a web application server for the identification of clinically important variants in patient samples.
4. Creating a genomic resource database for crops of national importance
Selected Publications
A Singh, AK Mahato, A Maurya, R Subramani, AK Singh, R Bhardwaj, SK Kaushik, S Kumar, V Gupta, K Singh, R Singh (2023). Amaranth Genomic Resource Database (AGRDB): an integrated database resource of Amaranth genes and genomics. Frontiers in Plant Science. Volume 14 - 2023
doi: 10.3389/fpls.2023.1203855
AK Mahato, S Singh, S Singh, P Jayaswal, N Singh, M Dheer, P Goel, RS Raje, JK Yasin, R Sreevasthsa, V Rai, K Gaikwad, NK SIngh (2020). A 62K genic-SNP chip array for genetic studies and breeding applications in pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan L. Millsp.). Nature Scientific reports. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-61889-0
A Singh, Y Singh, AK Mahato, P Jayaswal, S Singh, R Singh, N Yadav, AK Singh, PK Singh, R Singh, R Kumar, E M Septiningsih, HS Balyan, NK Singh,V Rai (2020). Allelic sequence variation in the Sub1A, Sub1B and Sub1C genes among diverse rice cultivars and its association with submergence tolerance. Nature Scientific reports. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-65588-8.
AK Mahato, S Arora, S Singh, P Mandal, S Bhutani, et al (2017). A high-density intraspecific SNP linkage map of pigeonpea (Cajanas cajan L. Millsp.). PLoS ONE. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0179747.
AK Mahato, N Sharma, A Singh, M Srivastav, Jaiprakash, SK Singh, AK Singh, TR Sharma, NK Singh (2016). Leaf Transcriptome Sequencing for Identifying Genic-SSR Markers and SNP Heterozygosity in Crossbred Mango Variety ‘Amrapali’ (Mangifera indica L.). PLoS ONE. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0164325.