Garikapati Narahari Sastry

Garikapati Narahari Sastry
Sastry in 2019
Born	1966 (age 58–59) Andhra Pradesh, India
Nationality	Indian
Alma mater	Osmania University, University of Hyderabad
Known for	Molecular Modeling and Computer-Aided Drug Design
Scientific career
Fields	Chemistry, theoretical chemistry, Computer Aided Drug Design
Institutions	IIT-Hyderabad North East Institute of Science and Technology, Jorhat Indian Institute of Chemical Technology Pondicherry University
Doctoral advisor	Eluvathingal Devassy Jemmis,
Other academic advisors	Sason Shaik
Website	https://neist.res.in/gnsastry/

Garikapati Narahari Sastry is an Indian Chemist and a Professor at the Department of Biotechnology at IIT-Hyderabad.^[1] He served as Director of CSIR- North East Institute of Science and Technology, Jorhat^[2] Jorhat, Assam from 19 February 2019 and served there till 10 January 2024.^[3][4] After taking charge as the Director, he has worked towards converting knowledge in the areas of computational modelling and Artificial intelligence from basic to translational research, by working closely with society and industry. Ultimately, revitalizing the strength of science and technology is essential in achieving the self-reliant and strong India. In the era of Industry 4.0 and 5.0, combining our traditional wisdom with modern science appear to be indispensable in the sectors such as Education, Health, Agriculture, Industrial and Societal development at large. Prior to joining as the Director, he headed the Molecular Modelling Division at the CSIR Indian Institute of Chemical Technology in Hyderabad, India. Sastry has made pioneering contributions in the areas of computational chemistry and computational biology.

He was awarded Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology in 2011, the highest science award in India, in the chemical sciences category.^[5]

Early life and education

G. N. Sastry completed his BSc (1985) and MSc (1988) from Osmania University. He earned his PhD from University of Hyderabad in Theoretical and Computational Chemistry under the supervision of Prof. E. D. Jemmis in 1995. Subsequently, he moved to Israel to carry out his first postdoctoral studies (1994 – 1996) with Prof. Sason Shaik in Hebrew University where he majorly focused on valance bond modelling and electronic transfer reactions. In 1996, he moved to Switzerland and did his second postdoctoral studies with Prof. Thomas Bally in University of Fibourg, Switzerland. In Switzerland he worked in Molecular modelling and theoretical and physical organic chemistry.

Career

After two postdoctoral stints, he moved to India and he has served as Assistant Professor in Pondicherry University for five years (1997 – 2002). There majorly focused on Molecular modelling and theoretical and physical organic chemistry. In 2002 he moved to CSIR – Indian Institute of Chemical Technology, Hyderabad where he served for almost two decades and made fundamental contributions in supramolecular chemistry which itself is a highly interdisciplinary areas. On 19 February 2019, he took charge as a Director in CSIR – North East Institute of Science and Technology, Jorhat, Assam and served their till 10 January 2024. Currently, he is serving as Professor at Department of Biotechnology at IIT-Hyderabad.

Scientific contributions

Sastry's group is highly interdisciplinary with diverse background that include chemistry, biology, material science, and computer science. With more than 300 research papers, which received over ~11000 citations, and an h-index of 52, he is one of the most prolific scientist in India making contributions in areas like noncovalent interactions,^[6][7] computer aided drug design,^{[8][9][10][11]} bucky bowl chemistry,^[12][13] and applications of machine learning in computational drug discovery.^[14][15] He is also interested to unravel ~5000 years of traditional knowledge with 100 years of modern science. DISHA (Development of Informatics for Societal Health Advancement) has been conceived by Dr. G.N. Sastry with the aim to leverage the activities of data driven approaches in healthcare.

In the last decade, his group is involved in developing an indigenous software, Molecular Property Diagnostic Suite (MPDS),^[16][17][18] which aims to strengthen the computational drug discovery, and thereby working towards Aatmanirbhar Bharat. Dr. Sastry is also involved in a number of outreach programs and widely traveled across the globe and has visited over 25 countries. His stays as a visiting professor (faculty) in Japan, USA, Germany and Switzerland, besides several short visits to attend and organize meetings abroad has established a strong relationship in building international collaborations across the disciplines.

Fellowships and memberships

• Fellow of Indian National Science Academy (FNA)^[19]
• Fellow of Indian Academy of Sciences (FASc)^[20]
• Fellow of National Academy of Sciences India (FNASc)^[21]
• Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC)
• Fellow of Biotech Research Society, India (BRSI)^[22]
• Fellow of Telangana Academy of Sciences (Founder Fellow)^[23]
• Fellow of Andhra Pradesh Akademi of Sciences (FAPAS)^[24]
• Life member of World Association of Theoretically Oriented Chemists (WATOC)
• Life member of American Chemical Society (ACS)
• Life member of Asia-Pacific Conference of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry (APCTCC)
• Life member of Chemical Research Society of India (CRSI)
• Life member of Andhra Pradesh Akademi of Sciences
• Life member of Indian Biophysical Society
• Life member of Bioinformatics and Drug Discovery Society (BIDDS)

Prizes and honours

• Recipient of J. C. Bose National Fellowship of the Department of Science and Technology, New Delhi – 2015^[25][26]
• Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology – 2011.
• B. M. Birla Scientist prize for chemistry – 2001^[27]
• The Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship^[28]
• The Swarnajayanti Fellowship – 2005 ^[29]
• National Bioscience Award for Career Development 2009^[30]
• The CRSI Medal – 2010
• B. C. Deb Memorial Award for Soil/ Physical Chemistry, Indian Science Congress, 2008 ^[31]
• Special Award for Promotion of Ethnopharmacology, International Congress for Society for Ethnopharmacology, 2022
• A species of begonia was named 'Begonia Narahari'.^[32]

Leadership activities

As the Director, Dr. Sastry has shown outstanding leadership with many major programs and creating facilities contributing to the northeast region as well as nation.

• CSIR Summer Research Training Programme 2020, 16 June – 22 Aug 2020 ^[33][34]
• Drug Discovery Hackathon 2020 Training programme, 13 July 2020 - 12 Sept 2020 ^[35][36]
• Drug Discovery Hackathon 2020 Mentorship and Training programme, 30 September 2021 - 31 March 2022 ^[37]
• Establishment of Covid-19 testing facilities ^[38][39]
• Dr B. K. Saikia awarded Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar ^[40]
• CSIR-NEIST awarded State Science Award 2019 for Science Popularisation and Research ^[41]
• Center for Petroleum Research funded by Department of Fertilizers, Ministry of Chemical and Fertilizers ^[42]
• DBT funded of Center of Excellence in Advanced Computation and Data Sciences
• Center for Infectious Diseases^[43]
• Regional cum Facilitation Center (RCFC), National Medicinal Plant Board^[44]
• BioNEST Bioincubator^[45]
• NABL Accreditation for Testing/Analysis services, 2021
• CSIR-Centre for Post-Harvest Processing and Research at Itanagar^[46][47]
• Multi-locational Trial & Regional Research Experimental Field across the northeast^[48]

References

1. "G. Narahari Sastry". IIT Hyderabad. Retrieved 30 March 2024.
2. "CSIR-NEIST, Jorhat". www.rrljorhat.res.in. Retrieved 26 March 2019.
3. "Assam: CSIR-North East Institute of Science and Technology gets new director". Northeast Now. 19 February 2019. Retrieved 26 March 2019.
4. Geetanath, V. (4 March 2019). "IICT scientist to head CSIR's only north east lab". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 26 March 2019.
5. "11 scientists selected for Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar award" ibn live, Sep 26,2011 [1]
6. Mahadevi, A. Subha; Sastry, G. Narahari (2016). "Cooperativity in Noncovalent Interactions". Chemical Reviews. 116 (5): 2775–2825. doi:10.1021/cr500344e. PMID 26840650.
7. Kumar, Nandan; Saha, Soumen; Sastry, G. Narahari (2021). "Towards developing a criterion to characterize non-covalent bonds: A quantum mechanical study". Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics. 23 (14): 8478–8488. Bibcode:2021PCCP...23.8478K. doi:10.1039/D0CP05689H. PMID 33876011. S2CID 233308675.
8. Badrinarayan, Preethi; Sastry, G. Narahari (2011). "Sequence, Structure, and Active Site Analyses of p38 MAP Kinase: Exploiting DFG-out Conformation as a Strategy to Design New Type II Leads". Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling. 51 (1): 115–129. doi:10.1021/ci100340w. PMID 21141877.
9. Badrinarayan, Preethi; Sastry, G. Narahari (2014). "Specificity Rendering "Hot-Spots" for Aurora Kinase Inhibitor Design: The Role of Non-Covalent Interactions and Conformational Transitions". PLOS ONE. 9 (12): e113773. Bibcode:2014PLoSO...9k3773B. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0113773. PMC 4259475. PMID 25485544.
10. Choudhury, Chinmayee; Priyakumar, U. Deva; Sastry, G. Narahari (2015). "Dynamics Based Pharmacophore Models for Screening Potential Inhibitors of Mycobacterial Cyclopropane Synthase". Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling. 55 (4): 848–860. doi:10.1021/ci500737b. PMID 25751016.
11. Madugula, Sita Sirisha; Nagamani, Selvaraman; Jamir, Esther; Priyadarsinee, Lipsa; Sastry, G. Narahari (2022). "Drug repositioning for anti-tuberculosis drugs: An in silico polypharmacology approach". Molecular Diversity. 26 (3): 1675–1695. doi:10.1007/s11030-021-10296-2. PMID 34468898. S2CID 237372892.
12. Purushotham, Uppula; Sastry, G. Narahari (2013). "Conjugate acene fused buckybowls: Evaluating their suitability for p-type, ambipolar and n-type air stable organic semiconductors". Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics. 15 (14): 5039–5048. Bibcode:2013PCCP...15.5039P. doi:10.1039/C3CP44673E. PMID 23450210.
13. Hussain, M. Althaf; Vijay, Dolly; Sastry, G. Narahari (2016). "Buckybowls as adsorbents for CO2, CH4, and C2H2: Binding and structural insights from computational study". Journal of Computational Chemistry. 37 (3): 366–377. doi:10.1002/jcc.24242. PMID 26519620. S2CID 461837.
14. John, Lijo; Soujanya, Yarasi; Mahanta, Hridoy Jyoti; Narahari Sastry, G. (2022). "Chemoinformatics and Machine Learning Approaches for Identifying Antiviral Compounds". Molecular Informatics. 41 (4): e2100190. doi:10.1002/minf.202100190. PMID 34811938. S2CID 244490227.
15. Singh, Prateek; et al. (2022). "A machine learning-based approach to determine infection status in recipients of BBV152 (Covaxin) whole-virion inactivated SARS-CoV-2 vaccine for serological surveys". Computers in Biology and Medicine. 146: 105419. doi:10.1016/j.compbiomed.2022.105419. PMC 9040372. PMID 35483225. S2CID 245261536.
16. Gaur, Anamika Singh; et al. (2017). "Assessing therapeutic potential of molecules: Molecular property diagnostic suite for tuberculosis MPDS TB". Journal of Chemical Sciences. 129 (5): 515–531. doi:10.1007/s12039-017-1268-4. S2CID 199377264.
17. Nagamani, S.; Gaur, A. S.; Tanneeru, K.; Muneeswaran, G.; Madugula, S. S.; Consortium, Mpds; Druzhilovskiy, D.; Poroikov, V. V.; Sastry, G. N. (2017). "Molecular property diagnostic suite (MPDS): Development of disease-specific open source web portals for drug discovery". Sar and Qsar in Environmental Research. 28 (11): 913–926. Bibcode:2017SQER...28..913N. doi:10.1080/1062936X.2017.1402819. PMID 29206500. S2CID 22904128.
18. Gaur, Anamika Singh; Nagamani, Selvaraman; Tanneeru, Karunakar; Druzhilovskiy, Dmitry; Rudik, Anastassia; Poroikov, Vladimir; Narahari Sastry, G. (2018). "Molecular property diagnostic suite for diabetes mellitus (MPDSDM): An integrated web portal for drug discovery and drug repurposing". Journal of Biomedical Informatics. 85: 114–125. doi:10.1016/j.jbi.2018.08.003. PMID 30092360. S2CID 51952429.
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27. Organisms, objects and ocean are their work indianexpress.com ^{[dead link‍]}
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29. "Swarnajayanti Fellowship" (PDF). www.dst.gov.in. Retrieved 2 July 2022.
30. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 25 April 2012. Retrieved 25 October 2011.
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46. "Itanagar: CSIR and CMERI set up 'centre for post harvest processing and research | Arunachal24". 20 August 2019.
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