The UNT College of Science is pleased to welcome Dr. Rohan Balakrishnan to the UNT Biological Sciences department as one of their newest Assistant Professors. Dr. Balakrishnan's research is in molecular biology, microbiology, and biochemistry.

"My current research objective is to understand how microbes survive during starvation," said Dr. Balakrishnan, who earned his PhD in biochemistry from Ohio State University and completed his postdoc at UC San Diego. "While not much is known about the physiology of starving microbes, there is a growing interest in how bacteria survive during starving conditions as it relates to several research areas, from environmental microbiology, how cooperating microbial communities are established, to antibiotic resistance and microbial persistence."

Dr. Balakrishnan says he is excited about the diversity and variety of research that is being conducted at UNT right now. "Being here means I have an amazing opportunity to interact and learn from excellent researchers engaged in a wide collection of research interests," he said.

In his lab in the UNT Life Science Center, Dr. Balakrishnan will be investigating his research questions using a combination of classical biochemistry and methodologies like mass-spec proteomics, RNA-sequencing, and simple quantitative models. He is encouraging students who are interested in his research to reach out to him via email.

"I am excited to introduce my students to a quantitative approach to understanding various aspects of microbial and cellular physiology," he said. "I will strive to incorporate this in my teaching as well as in research as I build collaborative partnerships on the campus."