Good day, Dr. Gunjan Guha. I'm Arjun. I've had a look through your background and your professional record. I'm interested in hearing more about your work and how you see yourself fitting in here with our faculty. Ready to start?

Put it to start.

Please start by introducing your professional journey in academia.

Right, so starting from my.

UG degree. I have a BSc honors in zoology.

I got my degree in the year 2003. I followed it up with a Masters in Zoology with specialization in Molecular Biology and genetics in the year 2005, again from the same university, University of Calcutta.

From the University of Calcutta.

Followed by that I pursued my PhD degree from Vellore Institute of Technology, Vellore Campus in Cell Biology and that was in 2010 when I got my degree. I followed this up with a post doc at Oregon State University in the United States.

Where I was working on cancer biology.

And immune responses in skin inflammation mostly looking at genes like BC level and B that is C tip 2.

And dermal homeostasis.

And also I worked on biosynthetically engineered factomizing analogues as novel cancer intervention for hidden ex commercial carcinoma there where we had a novel strategy of.

Curtailing cancer by putting them to sleep, that is, without being harsh to the peripheral cells to limit or minimize the collateral damage.

And I have still more to add to that and then.

Thank you

Once I return back to India, I joined Shastra Deemed University as an Assistant Professor where I have been working since then since 2014.

I completed my postdoc on November 2013 and joined Shastra in January 2014.

Astra, I have worked in three different projects.

Uh, which are my labs major research goal?

I am the leader of the Cellular Laboratory at Shastra in the School of Science and Technology.

Where we practically look at three different aspects #1 is looking at the role of mitochondria in aging and degenerative diseases. Secondly, we looked at the the role of cancer chemotherapy drugs in inducing thromboembolism in patients and we were looking at the molecular pathway to truncate to mitigate that. And thirdly, we were looking at breast adenocarcinoma, triple negative breast.

Carcinoma and looking at the role of centrosome clustering in mitigating the rate of cancer. Proclamation.

Uh, these projects were all funded by DST and DBT. Yeah, I think that would be all. Thank you.

Thank you, Professor. Let’s delve deeper into your expertise and achievements. Could you describe how your research on centrosome clustering in triple-negative breast carcinoma might translate into novel therapeutic strategies?

For the triple negative breast cancers, as we know that it's a very robust form of cancer and they are also often multi drug resistant. So in that case finding a proper intervention for triple negative breast cancer can be a huge challenge. It has been a huge challenge over the decades and the years. Now we know that centrosomes in a normal cell will form a dipole during cell division and if there are multiples that is multiple centrosomes are formed.

Yes, I can.

Then in that case the cell, a normal cell does not divide. However, when it comes to a cancer cell, certain cancer cells, one of the examples being triple negative breast cancer, the centrosomes can have multipolarity, but they will arrange in two poles forming a pseudotype pole.

So to address that and to mitigate the formation of the pseudo dipole can be a crucial approach in treating triple negative breast cancer where we often find centrosome clustering. Now this particular approach hasn't been researched a lot. If we look at the literature, a very few groups in the world has been working on this. One of the major groups is my group where we have worked with triple negative breast cancer from the purview of.

As we talk about this, if you look at the future prospects of this approach, it can very well be a major tool by addressing the, you know, pseudo dipole formation to mitigate the formation of pseudo dipole formation. It can be a very potent and pertinent tool as a therapeutic model, as a therapeutic, as an intervention system in the future, if you can just pause. And stop the progression of the cell growth.

Centrosome clustering.

The cell division in such cancers simply by addressing the clustering of centrosomes into pseudo dipoles. That would be in a very concise manner the answer to your question. Thank you.

Thank you, Professor. Your explanation highlights a fascinating and promising therapeutic angle. Could you elaborate on the challenges or limitations you foresee when translating your findings on centrosome clustering into clinical applications?

The challenges right now are that the there are multiple cellular pathways which are or interspersed with each other. Now when we look at such pathways, excuse me, when we look at search pathways, there is a lot of variability which we have to take into account now. For example, the diversity in the different types of triple negative breast cancer cells can in itself be per SE huge.

Which if we address a particular pathway in one group of cells, a particular type of breast cancer, triple negative breast cancer, in another triple negative breast cancer, the same pathway might be affected in a very different way. To have an empirical intervention structure, we need to address this specific challenge that if we can modulate the cell growth of the triple negative breast cancer in one particular cell type, we should be able to do that for all triple negative breast cancer.

Now currently if you look at that, the complexities are so huge that it will take years of research to reach there before it really gets into the clinical perspective. And we where we it goes to the patients at the clinical level. But the progress that we are having are I should say are very promising and we do find if we can focus on that from our group and of course there are other groups who are also coming in from all around the world, a few groups though not a lot.

We are in conversation and communication. We correspond with each other to discuss how things are progressing and this can be a very good clinical intervention in the long run, but it still will need a lot of work on our part. Thank you.

Yeah, sure.

Sorry, can you repeat yourself?

Certainly, Professor. Could you share your philosophy on teaching and how you approach complex topics, like the ones in your research, to ensure students grasp and engage with them effectively?

All right. So there are certain similarities in that aspect between research and teaching learning.

The pedagogical approach for the teaching strategy that I have, like my research, is broadly outcome based.

Now what we normally have in research is we have an outcome, we have a goal set in our mind and we.

As we commonly call it outcome based education, or OBE.

Make a pathway to reach that particular goal and obviously we do the experimentation in the teaching. Similarly, we have an outcome based education. So we are looking at that final outcome where a student should. It's not about passing the exam, it's about learning. So a student should learn. And when I say learning, it should be conceptual learning. So what I personally do in my teaching paradigm is I look at first and foremost to intricately explain the concepts.

Hypothetically.

Be it a complex one. If it's a complex 1, then we can break it down into smaller parts. You know, like atomic habits. So it's like an atomic understanding, smaller fragmented understanding of individual parts so that the whole picture, eventually pieces of the jigsaw puzzle all come together and the student gets the grasp of that concept thoroughly once we have that concept.

Ready in the mind of the student. The student has actually learned it. Now what happens next is the student will be given analytical questions to solve from practical life, from real life examples as well as well known examples which are set in.

Once the students can grasp those, we are kind of in a zone where we can say that the outcome is within our reach, within our site.

So then we will be having evaluations at a regular basis.

There this is incongruence with the National Education Policy 2020 from the Government of India where we look at object based outcome based education. So the outcome at the end of the day should not be passing the exam rather should be understanding the concept thoroughly and then applying the concepts in whatever challenges are thrown as exams or like real life challenges.

And eventually as a job challenge, as a job project, whatever is thrown at a particular candidate, the candidate, he or she should be able to handle that properly. So that's the basic outline how I approach teaching.

Thank you.

Thank you, Professor. Your emphasis on conceptual understanding and outcome-based education is commendable. Before we proceed further, may I inquire how you balance mentoring research students with classroom teaching, particularly in advanced and interdisciplinary subjects?

Well, maintaining resource students in my lab, in my research group, whereas visa V. If I look at the classroom teaching, there are two different wheels of any academic career in the present contemporary situation in the scenarios that we face now.

A complex.

I'm not done, sorry. I'll just like to continue on that now. A complex situation in the classroom, a complex subject is a classroom can be broken down as I said into simplistic concepts and then inculcated into the students. Similarly, when we are mentoring the students in the research lab, we have a set goal, We have weekly meetings to monitor where, how far we are from the set goal and so that we stick to the road map and we can again break down the.

Entire strategy into smaller parts, smaller blocks so each block can be achieved and then holistically the whole project can be eventually the goal can be reached. So while we mentor well I mentor a student a research student, I make sure that the concepts of the research, the scientific goals are clear in their head We look at the road map and definitely what I do is a weekly meeting to monitor their progress and to.

Shoot their problems. So that is, uh, the broader worldview that I have for mentoring research students. Thank you.

Sure.

Great, please go ahead.

So far if I look at my publication profile.

I have 54 publications out of which except 3, all of them are SCI index articles and the remaining three are also Scopus indexed articles and land share. A majority of those publications are in highly esteemed high impact journals. My cumulative impact factor in this 54 paper is 54 papers is around 510.

I have till date more than 8500 citations.

I have a high h-index which is 32 and a high I-10 index also which is around 40.

So overall, I believe that my publications, our research publications are.

Contributing to the scientific field because of the high fatigues that I have.

Similarly, in parallel, apart from the research publications, the general publications, there are conference publications, there are I have 5 book chapters and I have even written scientific articles for newspapers they can handle to be precise. So overall, the perspective that I have for dissemination of scientific knowledge is clear cut apart from the classroom and the mentoring part where we directly interact with the students. There is the bigger goal of disseminating that knowledge to the greater community.

To the world through the research publications, high impact research publications, that's very, very pertinent and very, very important. The quality of research cannot be compromised with and also clearly properly timed publications coming up from my research group. Thank you.

Sure.

Can can you repeat the question please?

Please go ahead.

Certainly, Professor. Could you describe your experience with guiding funded or collaborative research projects?

Right. So till date, I as a principal investigator in this tenure as an assistant professor in my current position, in my current designation, I have obtained two major grants, one which was funded by DBT at the Department of Biotechnology, which had the amount approved amount of 49.99 lakhs, almost 50,00,000.

And the other one was from DSG serve which was around 27,00,000.

In both the projects, I was the principal investigator.

These are all long term, 3 year, three-year tenure projects which I have already completed. And the publications, some of them are in the pipeline, most of the publications are already out there.

Thank you.

Thank you, Professor. Your success in securing and leading significant funded projects reflects strong research leadership. Could you also elaborate on how you approach industry collaborations or consultancy within your work?

If I talk about my overall collaboration and consultancy.

Uh, industry collaborations that I have right now have been limited since the COVID, but we have been working in tandem with different research groups around the world. For example, my active collaborations are with Guten Johannberg University in Mainz, Germany. Then I have collaborations with Minor Motors Medical School in the USA. Cincinnati University in Ohio in USA.

Although these apparently are academic collaborations, these collaborators are in tie up with different industries, different industry partners. So the research group, the overall collaboration that we have, the consortium if I may call it that is oriented towards because this outcome is research. So that is oriented towards you know bench to bedside approach where the industry partners of my collaborators.

We all work together and certain uh, novel drugs have been designed which are right now in different phases of trials, which will eventually hopefully go out in the world. And also I would like to mention that I am one of the three scientists who were select who was, who had selected from India to be a part of this global consortium called Getting to Know Cancer, which was based in Nova Scotia, Canada.

Where I was a team leader in evision of growth signaling while designing a broad spectrum multi pronged approach to tackle different forms of cancer. This was a huge collaboration and I'm very proud to, you know, state that that I was one of the team leaders and also one of the three Indian scientists chosen for this representing my country at the global stage. Thank you.

Thank you, Professor. Your blend of academic collaborations with industry-focused outcomes and global consortium leadership is truly impressive. This exemplifies the vital link between research and practical societal benefits. Having explored your research, teaching, and collaboration experiences comprehensively, would you like to highlight anything else?

Well.

I am looking for this position because I have been looking at VI TS growth over the year. The university has really gone from one state status to another, continuously uplifting its performances as we can see in the ranking.

It has a research outlook that I believe is also aligning with the global research outlook, which is also my outlook, which is continuous R&D development outcome based research. And in that I believe that, you know, I'm really interested and I believe that I can really contribute to the growth of the university, my own career as well as the overall broader scientific field.

And.

And looking at the academic part, the teaching part.

I was looking at VI TS policies and the alignment with the National Education Policy 2020 from the Government of India that VIT has is really a, you know, feather in the cap for the university where I think also aligning with my interests the way I want to teach students or I normally go ahead with my teaching approach.

So I believe this opportunity will be very helpful and very lucrative for me personally for my academic and research growth in my career, as well as I'll be able to contribute to the university in the teaching research.

Mentoring students as well as doing any fundamental academic duties that's assigned to me. Thank you.

Uh, no, I don't have anything else to ask. Just I want to thank you and the university for the opportunity and I hope that I'm selected and I can contribute to the growth, as I said of the university.

Thank you, Professor. Your alignment with the university's vision, dedication to contributing academically, and emphasis on research excellence are admirable. That concludes our discussion. Is there anything else you'd like to address or ask?

Uh, in the longer spam. Thank you so much.