Dr. Lena Robra is a curious scientist and trained biochemist with a strong interest in sustainability. She has been heading the Academic Engagement team at Swissnex in India since 2021. Prior to this, she led the Bengaluru Sustainability Forum, an entity formed by Bengaluru’s academic institutions aimed at bringing the UN SDGs to the local context. She holds a PhD in Biology from the National Science Institute/Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and a Master’s degree in Biochemistry from Hannover University. She is also a member of the K2A Executive Committee.

Prof. Patrick Viollier is a bacterial geneticist and cell biologist with a PhD in microbiology from UNIBAS. After completing a postdoc at Stanford University and an assistant professorship at Case Western Reserve University, he became an Associate Professor at the University of Basel in 2009, later named Professor in 2015. He teaches bacteriology to third-year medical students, and since 2022 had run a practical course in bacteriology for both biology students and medical students on AMR and bacterial cell biology. His recent research explores the sensitivity of Caulobacter crescentus mutant cells to the peptidoglycan-targeting antibiotic vancomycin. This work has expanded his interest in applying chemical-genetic approaches with antibiotics, leading to new concepts in drug resistance and protection in Pseudomonas aeruginosa mutants with cell envelope defects.

Prof. Anjana Badrinarayanan is an Associate Professor of Microbiology at the National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bengaluru. Her research focuses on understanding the mechanisms of bacterial DNA damage response and repair. By using quantitative cell biological approaches, her lab investigates how bacteria regulate these pathways to adapt to stressful environments, such as those encountered within the host. These mechanisms play a crucial role in bacterial survival, allowing them to evolve resistance to antibiotics. Anjana’s work aims to provide insights into the cellular processes that enable bacteria to thrive under adverse conditions, contributing to the development of strategies to combat antimicrobial resistance.

Prof. Sunish Radhakrishnan completed his PhD at Pondicherry University and pursued postdoctoral studies at the Case School of Medicine, Cleveland, and the Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva. Before joining IISER Pune in 2019, he was an Assistant Professor at IISER Thiruvananthapuram, India, and an Associate Professor at the University of Warwick, UK. The work in Sunish’s group is focused on understanding the signaling network that regulates bacterial cell cycle and proliferation in response to nutrient availability and metabolism. The lab aims to uncover how this network is reprogrammed when cells encounter external cues, such as antimicrobials. This research is crucial for developing new strategies to combat antimicrobial resistance and enhance the efficacy of existing antibiotics.