Experience

U.S. National Institute of Health (NIH), contracted through Axle Informatics, MD, USA
Bioinformatics Scientist - National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) (2022 - 2025)

• Member of the Integrated Data Sciences Section, which provides data analysis and experimental design for NGS experiments conducted by clinical researchers at NIAID and other institutes within NIH.
• Supported 20 bioinformatics analysis projects across 15 research teams, developing workflows to analyze large datasets for bulk and single-cell RNA-seq, CITE-seq, TCR-seq, whole genome sequencing and metagenomics, using R, Python, Snakemake, and SLURM-based HPC systems
• Coauthored and contributed to peer-reviewed scientific publications (1 published, 4 in process) and conference presentations, and in support of a pilot clinical study, resulting in NIH institutional review board approval for a large-scale trial
• Analyzed data from a wide range of sequencing technologies: Illumina, Pac-Bio, 10x Genomics, Oxford Nanopore through standardized and custom analysis pipelines for analyzing NGS data
• Implemented nf-core nextflow pipeline for analysis of CUT&Tag, ChIP-seq, and TCR-seq data, and contributed to the OpenOmics Github.
• Demonstrated effective project management and stakeholder engagement through on-time deliveries for up to seven concurrent projects with customers from diverse multicultural backgrounds

Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL USA
Graduate Thesis Student, Rao Research Group (2016 - 2022)

• Performed experiments and analyzed multiple RNA sequencing datasets to identify genes and metabolic pathways of interest in various model and non-model organisms.
• Collaborated on 10+ projects for bioinformatics analysis, developing pipelines to analyze multi-omics data, such as genome assembly, variant calling, and copy number identification.
• Identified new sugar transporters from non-model organisms using bioinformatics analysis
• Integration of RNA sequencing data with other bioinformatics datasets of various yeast and bacteria for characterizing differences in cellular behavior
• Studying the mechanism and regulation of storage metabolism in yeasts using computational models. Built a model for storage metabolism in python, with validation using growth experiments
• Understanding protein-protein interactions: expressed and purified multiple proteins from yeasts.

Unilever, Research and Development, Mumbai, India
Global Product Development Manager (2014 - 2016)

• Led the Surfactant flexibility team for global fabric cleaning portfolio, launched multi-surfactant formulations across 4 manufacturing sites, delivering $8M cost savings.
• Led the quality improvement workstream in collaboration with industrial partners to improve the delivered quality of a critical surfactant
• Championed sustainability efforts to reduce the formulation footprint by understanding the value chain of raw materials and identifying opportunities for footprint reduction

Unilever Future Leadership Program (2012 - 2013)

• Intensive 18-month training experience in project management, with cross-functional stints in marketing, research, packaging, and factory operations.

Chemical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, India
Undergraduate Research Student (Prof. Vivek V. Buwa) (2011 - 2012)

• Development of high-performance structured packing: Computational fluid dynamics modeling of methane-air combustion through catalyst impregnated monolith reactors