Retinal damage is one of the most common causes of blindness in the modern world. The obvious solution to this problem is to harness the regenerative potential of the retinal stem cells. The piscine model zebrafish offers the maximum potential in unraveling the mystery of retinal regeneration compared to mammalian and avian counterparts. I am working on signaling pathways like wnt, notch and hedgehog to assess their impact on fish retina regeneration.  I am also working on a few selected candidate genes like pluripotency inducing  factors  like  sox2,  oct4,  nanog,  klf4,  cMyc  and  lin28  involved  in  retina regeneration.  Currently  the  major  research  projects  I  am  carrying  out  are  (1)  An investigation  on  the  role  of  transcription  factors  Ascl1a,  FoxN4,  Zic2b  and  tumor suppressor Pten in retina regeneration and functional analysis of pluripotency factors in retinal stem cells, funded by Wellcome Trust-DBT India Alliance and (2) Understanding the molecular   mechanisms   of   epigenetically   regulated   genes   during   Muller   glia dedifferentiation and retina regeneration in zebrafish, funded by IISER Mohali.

 
For more information about our lab and research please visit   Ramachandran group page

• Soumitra Mitra, Poonam Sharma#, SimranKaur#, Mohammad Anwar Khursheed Shivangi Gupta, Riya Ahuja, Akshai Janardhana Kurup, Mansi Chaudhary, and Rajesh Ramachandran (2018). Histone Deacetylase-Mediated Muller Glia Reprogramming Through Her4.1-Lin28a axis is Essential for Retina Regeneration in Zebrafish. iScience 7: 68-84. (DOI- https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2018.08.008).
• Simran Kaur, Shivangi Gupta#, Mansi Chaudhary#, Mohammad Anwar Khursheed Soumitra Mitra, Akshai Janardhana Kurup and Rajesh Ramachandran© (2018). let-7 MicroRNA-Mediated Regulation of Shh Signaling and the Gene Regulatory Network Is Essential for Retina Regeneration. Cell Reports 23: 1409-1423.
• Soumitra Mitra, Poonam Sharma#, SimranKaur#, Mohammad Anwar Khursheed, Shivangi Gupta, Akshai Janardhana Kurup, Mansi Chaudhary, and Rajesh Ramachandran (2018). Myc-mediated dual regulation of lin28a is necessary during zebrafish retina regeneration. Journal of Cell Biology (in press).
• Rajesh Ramachandran, Xiao-Feng Zhao , Daniel Goldman. (2012). Insm1a-mediated gene repression is essential for the formation and differentiation of Muller glia-derived stem cells in the injured retina. Nature Cell Biology 14: 1013-1023.
• Jin Wan, Rajesh Ramachandran, Daniel Goldman (2012). HB-EGF Is Necessary and Sufficient for Müller Glia Dedifferentiation and Retina Regeneration. Developmental Cell  22: 334-347
• Rajesh Ramachandran , Xiao-Feng Zhao , Daniel Goldman (2011) An Ascl1a/Dkk/β-Catenin signaling pathway is necessary and glycogen synthase kinase-3β inhibition is sufficient for zebrafish retina regeneration. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 108: 15858-15863
• Rajesh Ramachandran, Blake Fausett and Daniel Goldman (2010). Ascl1a regulates Müller glia dedifferentiation and retina regeneration via a Lin28-dependent, let-7 miRNA signaling pathway. Nature Cell Biology 12: 1101-1107
• Rajesh Ramachandran, Aaron Reifler, Jack M. Parent and Daniel Goldman (2010). Conditional gene expression and lineage tracing of tuba1a expressing cells during zebrafish development and retina regeneration. Journal of Comparative Neurology 518:4196-4212.
• StevenT.Suhr,  Rajesh  Ramachandran,  Cynthia  L.  Fuller,  Matthew  B.  Veldman,  Christine A.  Byrd  and  Daniel Goldman (2008) Highly-restricted, cell-specific expression of the simian CMV-IE promoter in transgenic zebrafish with age and after heat shock. Gene Expression Patterns 9: 54-64.
• Rajesh   Ramachandran   and   K.C.   Majumdar.   (2008).   The   growth   hormone-encoding   gene   isolated   and characterized from Labeo rohita  Hamilton is expressed in CHO cells under the control of constitutive promoters in ‘autotransgene’ constructs. Fish Physiology and Biochemistry 34: 413-436.
• Rajesh Ramachandran and K.C. Majumdar. (2007)  A Comparative account of the structure of the growth hormone encoding gene and genetic interrelationship in six species of the genus Labeo. Fish Physiology and Biochemistry 33: 311-333.
• Rajesh Ramachandran and K.C. Majumdar.(2005). Transgene integration- an analysis in transgenic Labeo rohita
• Hamilton (Pisces: Cyprinidae). Fish Physiology and Biochemistry 31: 281-287.

Book Chapter

• Rajesh Ramachandran, Aaron Reifler, Jin Wan and Daniel Goldman (2012). Application of Cre-loxP Recombinationfor Lineage Tracing of Adult Zebrafish Retinal stem cells. In: Retinal Development: Methods and Protocols, Methods in Molecular Biology vol: 884 Shu-Zen Wang (ed.) (DOI 10.1007/978-1-61779-848-1_8). Humana Press, a part of Springer Science+Business Media New York 2012