Urvshi Kaveri Chandra

Biography

Urvshi is a Molecular Microbiologist from India. She graduated from Lund University in 2019 with a Master’s in Molecular Biology, Microbiology. During her Master’s thesis at Aarhus University, she was involved in the extraction of Ice Nucleation Proteins (INPs) using bacterial expression systems. INPs are a class of proteins found extensively in Gram-negative bacteria - Pseudomonas syringae. She used different E. coli based expression systems to express a recombinant INP. These were further purified using 3 different chromatographic separation techniques (IMAC, IEC and SEC). This exposure to the world of recombinant protein expression, chromatographic separation and proteomics, got her hooked on to the field of protein biology and structural biology. Before joining the University as a PhD student she worked with the video scientific journal - JoVE as a Curriculum Specialist. She helped faculty across the U.K. and other regions access JoVE resources to aid in teaching and research. Her PhD project is part of the MSCA-ITN ChemArch and a collaboration between the University of Copenhagen and the University of York. As part of this project, she will work to better understand protein-mineral interaction. She will also work to build on and develop protein extraction techniques for ancient ceramic vessels.

Research: ChemArch

In this project, she will use her experience in working with proteins and knowledge in molecular biology to extract proteins from archaeological artefacts. It is already known that ancient ceramic vessels are found to have deposits of proteins (eg. from milk) on their interior surfaces. She will employ LC-MS/MS and GC-MS methods to analyse the proteins extracted. Also, she will study ways to optimise existing extraction methods and determine the ability of organic molecules to bind to ceramics. Protein adsorption on mineral surfaces will be studied using AFM.

Report abuse