Sai Pallavi Pradeep
University of Connecticut

Talk Title: Developing Next-Generation Peptide Nucleic Acids for Antigene Therapy

Sai Pallavi Pradeep earned her B.Sc. in Chemistry, Zoology, and Microbiology from Bangalore University and her M.Sc. in Applied Microbiology from Vellore Institute of Technology in India. Following a research fellowship at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, she joined Dr. Raman Bahal’s lab at the University of Connecticut in 2021 to pursue her PhD in Pharmaceutical Sciences. Her research centers on designing chemically modified synthetic nucleic acids to target genomic DNA and RNA for precision medicine. Using solid-phase synthesis, she engineered anti-gene gamma peptide nucleic acids ( γPNAs) that silence the c-Myc oncogene, demonstrating antitumor activity in vitro and in vivo. She has tested the efficacy of clamp-G-modified nucleobases PNA to enhance RNAbinding affinity for miRNA and mRNA inhibition. Across multiple first-author publications, her work advances the design and delivery of clinically translatable oligonucleotide therapeutics for cancer and genetic diseases.