Who Is Prakruthi?
Prakruthi is an international student from Bangalore, India who is earning her PhD in the Dulin lab. Outside of the lab, Prakruthi is involved in many activities like cooking, dancing, and being a trained Indian classical musician that specializes in vocal performance. Prakruthi is also family-oriented and enjoys spending time with family and friends. In fact, one of Prakruthi’s favorite memories in the lab includes when Amy, Miriam, Val and herself attended the meeting of the American Society for Neural Therapy and Repair in August 2021. It was a great time getting to share exciting new science and watching Dr. Dulin present findings from the lab. Not to mention, they were able to extend their stay for a short vacation and had a relaxing time on the beach. Prakruthi also enjoys traveling to new spaces and having new experiences.
Prakruthi has always been inquisitive and passionate about science, more specifically
Biology. She found herself thinking about the different systems within our bodies and how something going wrong in them can lead to many health conditions. However, her father is the one who inspired her to go into research. He encouraged her to write about what she wanted her career path to be, and motivated her to realize the importance of research. This encouragement, in conjunction with taking higher level courses, is what ultimately guided Prakruthi to research.
Since pursuing her career in research, Prakruthi is constantly reminded of how little we know about the world and the reasons why we must dig deeper to try and solve the puzzles of science. When we dive deeper, we find our niche, try to solve our own tiny puzzles, and find answers to very specific questions. This is part of the reason why Prakruthi has chosen to pursue a research career. There is a lot to be discovered, and she wants to be among the pioneers of her scientific field.
Parkruthi’s Science
In the Dulin lab, Prakruthi’s project focuses on improving long-term outcomes by silencing pain signaling early after spinal cord injury. Maladaptive hyperactivity within primary nociceptor neurons of the dorsal root ganglion (DRG) is known to be one of the major contributing factors to the development of neuropathic pain, and also undermines locomotor recovery. Prakruthi’s research uses chemogenetic tools called Gi-DREADDs (inhibitory designer receptors exclusively activated by designer drugs) to silence the activity of these hyperactive pain neurons in a targeted manner without any side effects, with the goal of preventing neuropathic pain and improving long term functional outcomes after spinal cord injury.
In other words, neurons of our central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) have a unique ability to reorganize their lost connections to a limited degree in the event of an injury or trauma. Such recovery and improvements in lost function can be attributed to the special property of neurons called ‘plasticity’ - the ability of neurons that survive the injury to reorganize and compensate for lost functions. While this property is beneficial to a certain extent, it could actually have adverse effects on recovery. After spinal cord injury, there is a disruption in many motor and sensory circuits within the spinal cord. Although pain-sensing neurons exhibit a large amount of plasticity by sprouting new nerve fibers after spinal cord injury, this is bad because it brings about an inherently hyperactive state of these neurons leading to many adverse consequences on sensory and motor recovery after injury. This ‘bad’ plasticity often causes spinal cord injury patients to chronically experience persistent pain, which has a debilitating impact on quality of life. Hence, blocking abnormal pain signaling that occurs early after spinal cord injury could have beneficial effects. In Prakruthi’s study, she has used a technology called chemogenetics, which enables the expression of a receptor protein specifically within pain-sensing neurons. Upon activation, the receptor protein acts as a reversible ‘light switch’ to transiently silence pain neurons inhibiting them from signaling in an aberrant fashion. She has used this tool to silence pain neurons in the first few days after spinal cord injury in rats followed by assessment of sensory and locomotor behavior. Through this approach of pain silencing, we can achieve dual beneficial effects of preventing pain as well as improving locomotor recovery.
Dear Future Researcher,
When Prakruthi was asked if she had any advice for any future researchers, this is what she said.
“I would motivate them to trust themselves and their instincts and definitely give it a try if they are passionate about research. You’ll never know if you’ll enjoy it until you’re in it. I cannot emphasize enough the importance of asking questions. I would encourage them to think about why is it they want to pursue research and identify how strong their motivation is which will help them figure out why it is really important to them.”
As we come to a conclusion, we at the Dulin want to encourage you to Follow the Science!
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