The focus of our laboratory is three- fold: 

1. Computational genome mining: 
Analyse genomes computationally and explore interesting prope rties of proteins encoded therein. The major interest is in mining the Mycobacterium tuberculosis genome. This goal also includes assigning functional role to the OR Fans (ORF's whose function is unknown), and analyse them phylogenetically. Our approach in assigning functional role to the ORFans is based on high throughput threading of sequences into known protein folds, and generate hypotheses regarding functions based on three-dimensional structural similarities. Functional domains in ORFans are sought to be identifie d through this structure based approach. Methodologies for developing better threading algorithms are proposed to be developed. 

2. Identification of novel drug targets: 
Attempt to identify novel drug targets of M. tuberculosis with the help of computational analysis complemented by experimental work. Characterize these drug targets biochemically and later in their structural details using X-ray crystallography as the primary tool. Set up screens for rapid evaluation of inhibitors. 

3. Stress proteins and chaperones: 
Understand the structure- function properties of stress proteins. Of particular interest are molecular chaperones and their genetic regulators. Through this work, we also aim to address fundamental problems such as chaperone- assisted and/or spontaneous protein folding.