Bharath Sampadi

Research interests

• Stress responses and signaling dynamics.
• Oncogenic signaling
• Design principles of cell signaling cascades
• Novel ways to target cancer cells including synthetic “smart” circuits
• Novel technology development

Cell signaling cascades (or “circuits”) possess a wide-variety of quantitative properties including thresholds (filters), ultrasensitivity (switch-like responses), fold change detection (relative changes) and bistable switch (toggle switches) which are vital for cells to elicit appropriate responses to a stimulus (eg. growth factors, ligands or stress). I am interested in uncovering how cells utilize these “circuit designs” to make decisions and perhaps uncover novel ways to target cancer cells.

My current work involves characterizing the dynamics of stress-induced signaling cascades as well as the dynamic cross-talk between protein post-translational modifications (PTMs) including phosphorylation, ubiquitylation and SUMOylation signaling cascades in the DNA damage response and cancer.

I employ a diverse set of tools including – but not limited to – mass spectrometry, RNA-seq, microscopy, gene editing, imaging, organoids, assembloids, bioinformatics, mathematical modeling, organic chemistry, synthetic, cell and molecular biology. I am constantly looking for collaborative projects with researchers from diverse fields and are welcome to contact me. Students with novel ideas (or simply want to learn the basics) that want to do an internship are also welcome to inquire about possibilities.

Curriculum vitae

• Researcher |Protein post-translational modifications (PTM) cross-talk in cell signaling | Dept. of Cell and Chemical Biology | Leiden University Medical Center | Leiden
• PhD | Signaling dynamics in the DNA damage response | Dept. of Human Genetics | Leiden University Medical Center | Leiden
• MSc in Oncology | Phosphoproteomics in colorectal cancer | VU University Medical Center Amsterdam