Evolution is a multi-dimensional process that I try to integrate in my research. Plant viruses are perfect model to understand evolution that optimize their virulence on plants and vectors and adapts to the environment to ensure their survival in field conditions. During my doctoral training I worked under Prof. GarcĂa-Arenal, where my work was to understand the molecular mechanism for virus host range expansion and adaptation to climate change. Later, in my postdoctoral training, I carried forward with my evolution expertise to understand different aspects of viral biology, for example, molecular ecology, RNA structure mediated translation and replication that provided novel insights on viral capability to optimise several critical functionality simultaneously. In my first postdoc at UC Davis (later, Cornell), I was investigating the ability of viruses to regulate vector-mediated transmission. In my second postdoctoral training (ongoing) under Prof. Anne Simon Lab, I am focussing on the evolution of viral RNA structures that are critical structures for various functions apart from coding proteins e.g., binding proteins for viral translation or replication, providing stability to albeit sensitive RNA, thermosensitivity. In the future, I plan to study these RNA structures in an ecological context. Broadly, my research interest is understanding the viral RNA mediated ecological interactions in an agroecosystem mainly consisting of hosts, vectors, non-vectors, and microbes and predicting the response to climate change. My goal is to find the factors responsible for disease emergence and help designing preventive strategies that assist in sustainable agriculture with increase productivity.
Projects
Saffron Latent Virus effect on Secondary Metabolites (in collaboration with Dr. Shirin Parizad)
Publications
Expanding the Plant Virome: Umbra-Like Viruses Use Host Proteins for Movement
Anne E. Simon, Diego F. Quito-Avila, Sayanta Bera
Annual Review of Virology, vol. 11, 2024
Xiaobao Ying (1), Sayanta Bera (1), Jinyuan Liu, Roberto Toscano-Morales, Chanyong Jang, Stephen Yang, Jovia Ho, Anne E Simon
Plos Biology , vol. 22(4), 2024, pp. e3002600
Anna A Mikkelsen, Feng Gao, Elizabeth Carino, Sayanta Bera, Anne E Simon
Nucleic Acids Research, 2023
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