Roop Mallik is an Indian

biophysicist Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from molecular to organismic and populations. B ...

who works on nanoscale molecular

motor proteins Motor proteins are a class of molecular motors that can move along the cytoplasm of cells. They convert chemical energy into mechanical work by the hydrolysis of ATP. Flagellar rotation, however, is powered by a proton pump. Cellular functions ...

that transport material such as

viruses A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells Cell most often refers to: * Cell (biology), the functional basic unit of life Cell may also refer to: Locations * Monastic cell, a small room ...

, mitochondria,

endosomes Endosomes are a collection of intracellular sorting organelles in eukaryotic cells. They are parts of endocytic membrane transport pathway originating from the trans Golgi network. Molecules or ligands internalized from the plasma membrane ...

etc. inside living cells. The motors, such as

kinesin A kinesin is a protein belonging to a class of motor proteins found in eukaryotic cells. Kinesins move along microtubule (MT) filaments and are powered by the hydrolysis of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) (thus kinesins are ATPases, a type of enz ...

and

dynein Dyneins are a family of cytoskeletal motor proteins that move along microtubules in cells. They convert the chemical energy stored in ATP to mechanical work. Dynein transports various cellular cargos, provides forces and displacements importa ...

generate forces of pico-newton order to carry our various cellular processes namely cell division, vesicular transport, endocytosis, molecular tethering etc. His lab is working to understand how motor proteins help in degradation and clearance of pathogens, and also how these motors work inside the liver to maintain systemic lipid homeostasis in the animal. Mallik is currently a professor at th
Department of Biosciences and Bioengineering
Indian Institute of Technology Bombay
IIT Bombay
.

Early life

Mallik was born in 1970 in

Allahabad Allahabad (), officially known as Prayagraj, also known as Ilahabad, is a metropolis in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.The other five cities were: Agra, Kanpur (Cawnpore), Lucknow, Meerut, and Varanasi (Benares). It is the admin ...

, situated in the Northern India state of

Uttar Pradesh Uttar Pradesh (; , 'Northern Province') is a state in northern India. With over 200 million inhabitants, it is the most populated state in India as well as the most populous country subdivision in the world. It was established in 1950 ...

. His father is a machine design engineer and mother was a senior teacher.

Career

Mallik completed his post graduation in Physics in 1993 from

Allahabad University , mottoeng = "As Many Branches So Many Trees" , established = , type = Public , chancellor = Ashish Chauhan , vice_chancellor = Sangita Srivastava , head_label ...

. On the advice of his uncle, in 1994, he joined E. V. Sampathkumaran’s lab in Department of Condensed Matter Physics at

Tata Institute of Fundamental Research Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) is a public deemed research university located in Mumbai, India that is dedicated to basic research in mathematics and the sciences. It is a Deemed University and works under the umbrella of the De ...

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the secon ...

for doctoral research . After the completion of his PhD with over 20 international articles, Mallik joined G. Krishnamoorthy (TIFR) and Jayant Udgaonkar's labs (NCBS) for short stint as post doctoral fellow. This small tenure introduced him to the world of biology. In 2002, he joined the lab of Steven Gross at Department of Developmental and Cell Biology,

University of California, Irvine The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a public land-grant research university in Irvine, California. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, UCI offers 87 undergraduate degrees and 129 graduate and p ...

. In 2006 Mallik joined TIFR as assistant professor and became full professor in the Department of Biological Sciences. He moved from TIFR to the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay in 2020.

Personal life

Mallik is married to Dr. Sreelaja Nair, also a colleague at BSBE, IIT Mumbai. He is an avid outdoor enthusiast. He maintains a website of his travels and hikes.

Honors and awards

* Fellowship of the Indian National Science Academy (INSA) Delhi
Associate Membership of EMBO
(European Molecular Biology Organization) * DBT – Wellcome Trust India Allianc
Senior Research Fellowship
(January 2021 onwards) * The G.D. Birla Award for Scientific Research, 2019
Infosys Prize in Life Sciences 2018
*

Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology The Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology (SSB) is a science award in India given annually by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) for notable and outstanding research, applied or fundamental, in biology, ...

, 2014 * Fellowship of the Indian Academy of Sciences (IAS) Bengaluru * Wellcome Trust – DBT India alliance Senior Research Fellowship (2013–2018) * Wellcome Trust (UK) International Senior Research Fellowship (2006–2012) * Human Frontier Sciences Program HFSP Long-term Postdoctoral Fellowship

References

External links

Roop Malik's Home page
1970 births Living people Recipients of the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award in Biological Science {{biologist-stub