Research Area
Evolutionary Genetics: Intersexual Conflict, Life-History Evolution, Evolutionary Ecology of Immunity
Research Interests
My research interests are in the broad areas of Sexual conflict, Sexual Selection, Life-History Evolution and Evolutionary Ecology of Immunity. My research program aims to understand the effects of sexual conflict and sexual selection on aging and immune response. Theory predicts that intersexual conflict promotes increased investment in sexual activity under certain conditions. Hence, when these conditions are satisfied, increased investment in reproduction related activity should divert resources away from other activities involved with somatic maintenance. Further, sexual conflict may also influence the sex- specific gene regulation, especially of the ones involved in metabolic and immune path ways. Hence iIt follows that with resource acquisition having an upper limit, sexual conflict will influence both aging and immunity. I am testing these hypotheses using classical laboratory selection, phenotypic manipulation as well as molecular approaches.
Since 2024 : Chairperson, National Committee for International Union of Biological Sciences
Since 2012 : Member, International Committee of Society for Study of Evolution, USA
Since 2021 : Core Member of Expert Committee, Expert Committee – Life Sciences on Start up Research Grant & National Post-Doctoral Fellowship Schemes and Early Career Research Award Schemes
2023 - 2024 : Associate Editor, Proceedings of the Royal Society: B
2021 - 2023 : Associate Editor, Evolution, January
2015 - 2021 : Associate Editor, Journal of Genetics
2012 - 2015 : Editorial Board, Journal of Genetics
2007 - 2008 : Assistant Professor, School Of Life Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata.
1997 - 1998 : Lecturer, Department of Zoology, MES College of Arts, Commerce and Science, Bangalore University, Bangalore, India.
2003 - 2007 : Post Doctoral fellow Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada
1998 - 2003 : Evolutionary and Organismal Biology, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bengaluru
1995 - 1997 : Zoology, Bangalore University
1992 - 1995 : Chemistry, Botany, Zoology, MES College of Arts , Commerce and Science, Bangalore University, Bengaluru
Elected as Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, Bengaluru in January 2021.
Elected as Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy (INSA) in December 2018.
Founder Secretary, Indian Society of Evolutionary Biologists since June 2018.
Best Teacher award for 2012 at IISER Mohali.
Won the Best Thesis Medal (Biological Sciences) of JNCASR for 2005.
Aaditya Narasimhan, Jigisha, Rohit Kapila, Abhishek Meena, Santhosh and Nagaraj Guru Prasad. Consequences of adaptation to larval crowding on sexual and fecundity selection in Drosophila melanogaster. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 36(4):730–737, 2023.
TNC Vidya, Sutirth Dey, NG Prasad and Amitabh Joshi. The Darwinian core of evolutionary theory and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis: Similarities and differences. In Evolutionary biology: Contemporary and historical reflections upon core theory. Springer International Publishing Cham, 2023, pages 271–328.
Karan Singh, Manas Arun Samant and Nagaraj Guru Prasad. Evolution of cross-tolerance in Drosophila melanogaster as a result of increased resistance to cold stress. Scientific Reports 12(1):19536, 2022.
Paresh Nath Das, Aabeer Kumar Basu and Nagaraj Guru Prasad. Increasing adult density compromises survival following bacterial infections in Drosophila melanogaster. Journal of Insect Physiology 141:104415, 2022.
Neetika Ahlawat, Manas Geeta Arun, Komal Maggu, Jigisha, Aparajita Singh and Nagaraj Guru Prasad. Drosophila melanogaster hosts coevolving with Pseudomonas entomophila pathogen show sex-specific patterns of local adaptation. BMC Ecology and Evolution 22(1):77, 2022.
Tejinder Singh Chechi, Aaditya Narasimhan, Broti Biswas and Nagaraj Guru Prasad. Male mating success evolves in response to increased levels of male-male competition. Evolution 76(7):1638–1651, 2022.
Neetika Ahlawat, Komal Maggu, Jigisha, Manas Geeta Arun, Abhishek Meena, Amisha Agarwala and Nagaraj Guru Prasad. No major cost of evolved survivorship in Drosophila melanogaster populations coevolving with Pseudomonas entomophila. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 289(1974):20220532, 2022.
Komal Maggu, Sneha Kapse, Neetika Ahlawat, Manas Geeta Arun and Nagaraj Guru Prasad. Finding love: fruit fly males evolving under higher sexual selection are inherently better at finding receptive females. Animal Behaviour 187:15–33, 2022.