The historical development of the fields of genetics and evolution has been intertwined, at least since the time of Darwin in the mid-nineteenth century. Both fields, by virtue of the domains they address, also impact upon how we humans conceive of ourselves. Consequently, advances in understanding in genetics and evolution are answering age-old mysteries about … Continue reading More Information: “Mini symposium on Genetics and Evolution: Intertwined Strands” at Ashoka University (September 30- October 1, 2019)

I am thrilled to announce that we (@ashokauniversity) in association with Indian Academy of Sciences are organizing a two day long "Mini symposium on Genetics and Evolution: Intertwined Strands" . While this features some exciting talks by leading Evolutionary Biologists and Geneticists from India, it also has special interaction sessions for students and non-specialists in … Continue reading Mini-symposium on Genetics and Evolution @Ashokauniversity (30th September-1st October, 2019)

Please find the online preprint here

We welcome Biswajit from IISER Mohali who has joined us today at Ashoka as a SERB funded project assistant. He will be working on immunity, aging and co-infection. We all are excited to have a great time on bench

Finally, we reveal the ecological parameters that may drive evolution of immune priming (somewhat similar to what we see in human vaccination) in wild populations of flour beetles. Arun Prakash did an enormous study using 10 different wild-collected populations! hip hip hooray.. Read the paper here "Again, kids are costly when bugs are around....." Find the graphical … Continue reading Our new paper identifies ecological parameters that influence evolution of immune memory in wild insect populations

We have a funded project assistant position open. The selected applicant is expected to work on evolutionary understanding of aging and immunity. Duration of the project is initially one year, with a possibility of extension. For more information, please contact me at imroze.khan@ashoka.edu.in  

Fond farewell to Pavan who was one of my first students. He did some nice experiments on co-infection but now wants a career in music (rapper...whooh). We wish him good luck..)

Congratulations to Basabi, Srijan and Manasven for winning a poster award at the 2019 Understanding Behaviour conference at IISER Kolkata! The poster described how cannibalism can reduce resource competition in red flour beetle females who otherwise get engaged in a chemical war against each other under food stress. Image: L-R (Manasven, Basabi and Imroze)    

Our work on experimental evolution of memory-like response in insect immunity covered here (starts at 15:22). To find the published work, click the following  link

I am likely to consider 1 PhD student, starting from January 2019, with primary interest in experimental evolution and genetics of immunity, using insect models. Application portal is open now Last date of application is 15th December, 2018