Anurupa Devi Yadavalli, PhD

I am a Bioinformatician by choice. I squeeze tons of data into the computer with the goal of extracting valuable information. In other words, I manage, interpret and analyze data at the genome, proteome, and transcriptome levels.

I am interested in almost every question that deals with complex biological data involving B-cell development. During my Ph.D., I and my colleagues demonstrated that chromatin undergoes a dynamic switch to induce lineage-specific gene expression patterns. This study provided insights into how unique cis-regulatory networks are maintained across various B-cell stages and stood out as one of the first studies to report the dynamic nature of TADs (topologically associated domains). Later, I shifted my focus to implementing cutting-edge computational techniques and classification algorithms to identify transcriptional regulators that preserve B-cell identity.

Currently, my research is focused on understanding why V(D)J recombination and somatic hypermutation sometimes affect the off-target genes, and how such mistakes contribute to the development of B cell cancers known as lymphomas and leukemias.