I am a microbial ecologist having a passion for scientific explorations. I was born in Thiruvalla, Pathanamthitta, and completed my school education from Syrian Jacobite Public School, Thiruvalla. I have done my bachelors degree in Zoology from Women’s Christian College, Chennai (2010-13) and Masters degree in Marine Biology from Cochin University of Science and Technology (2013-15) with a First Rank from CUSAT. My research work was on “Bacterial diversity and its interaction with metals in glacio-marine environment of Arctic” under the guidance of Late Dr. K. P. Krishnan at the National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Goa. I completed my PhD in 2023 from the School of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, Goa University.
I worked as a Project Scientist at the National Institute of Ocean Technology, Chennai in 2022 and as a Research Fellow at National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research, Goa from 2015-2021. I have participated in two Indian Arctic Expeditions in the years 2017 and 2018 and has been trained for field sampling in extreme environments. My research work involved sampling in the extreme environments of the Arctic for addressing the key issues of climate change, the impact of metal pollution, and its effect on bacterial community composition in the Arctic. I have 9 publications in peer-reviewed international journals and has also characterized a novel bacterial species from the Arctic which is named as “Phenylobacterium glaciei”. I have expertise in microbiology, ecology, bioinformatics, and statistics.
I love being a Thalassophile and a Polar researcher who is passionate about science outreach activities.
