Vanitha Nithianandam

Dr. Nithianandam was recruited to the Adams Center from Harvard in 2025. She is a Research Scientist focusing on the Parkinson’s progression locus RIMS2 and protein clearance pathway, autophagy.

Dr. Nithianandam’s journey in neuroscience began at the National Brain Research Centre in India, supported by a prestigious national scholarship from the Indian Academy of Sciences, and was further solidified through clinical exposure during her internship at PGIMER Hospital, Chandigarh. She earned her PhD in Molecular and Cell Biology from Academia Sinica and the National Defense Medical Center in Taiwan, where she discovered and provided the first in vivo evidence of a novel dynamic form of neuronal actin, termed actin blobs. As a postdoctoral researcher with Professor Mel Feany at Harvard Medical School, she investigated the role of proteins implicated in Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease in the regulation of autophagy, with key findings published in Nature Communications. Her integrative work across Drosophila, mice models, and iPSC-derived neurons has advanced our understanding of neuronal development and degeneration.

At Yale, Dr. Nithianandam continues to explore autophagy and RIMS2 as a therapeutic target in Parkinson’s disease, driven by her enduring commitment to uncovering mechanisms of neurodegeneration and identifying novel avenues for intervention.