The Thackeray Lab
at Clark University
Suresh Kumar Kandasamy - PhD student
Bio: My lab works with PLC-gamma signaling in drosophila. In an attempt to identify modifiers of PLC-gamma dumpy, a gene involved in extracellular matrix (ECM) formation had been identified. My research interests focus on the role of dumpy in the drosophila wing development. Dumpy is a gigantic protein (2.5 MDa) involved in development of various tissues including wing. It is involved in organization of ECM. ECM is not only involved in the structural maintenance of the cell, but also in cell signaling. The protein is composed of many hundreds of small protein modules. It has 308 EGF and 185 DPY modules. The protein has a putative C-terminal transmembrane domain followed by a ZP domain, EGF-DPY repeats, a proline rich region, a P-F repeat and an N-terminal export signal sequence. The function of these many repeats in this protein is unclear. A protein of this sheer size with these many repeats suggests a role in formation of a fiber providing mechanistic properties to the cell. There is also an EGF repeat at the N-terminal end, which is a potential Calcium binding domain. Right now I am working on the genes interacting with dumpy. I did a screen using a deficiency kit to scan across the whole genome to identify genes that interact with dumpy and identified a few modifiers of dumpy.
Other research interests:
I am also working on a gene docked. The phenotype of docked mutant was similar dumpy mutants and we found interaction between docked and dumpy. We were able to find the gene coding for docked through sequencing and also we were able to rescue docked mutant phenotype using wild type docked transgenic constructs. Based on its yeast homologue we predict docked to be involved in vesicle traffic.
Outside the lab : Lately my interests are into tennis, workouts at gym, hiking and biking
Publications and Abstracts:
• Suresh k Kandasamy, Kiley Maguire and Justin R Thackeray. docked: involved in ER-Golgi vesicle transport? 50th Annual Drosophila Conference, Chicago, IL. Poster 205A.
• K. Suresh Kumar, G. Dhinakar Raj, A. Raja and P. Ramadass. Genotypic characterization of infectious bronchitis viruses from India. Indian Journal of Biotechnology. Vol 6, January 2007, pp 41-44. PDF
• G. Dhinakar Raj, K. Suresh Kumar, A. M. Nainar and K. Nachimuthu. Egg:embryo weight ratio as an indicator of dwarfism induced by infectious bronchitis virus. Avian Pathology (June 2004) 33(3), 307-309. PDF