Dr. Amritha Suresh

Integrated Head and Neck Oncology Research Program

Dr. Amritha Suresh, Ph.D.

amritha.suresh@ms-mf.org

Dr. Amritha Suresh is a Principal Scientist of the Integrated Head and Neck Oncology Program, at Mazumdar Shaw Center for Translational Research (MSCTR), Narayana Health, Bangalore. She is also a faculty of the Roswell Park-Mazumdar Shaw Cancer Center collaborative Research program. Dr. Suresh completed her doctoral program from Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology (JNU) and served as a Research Associate at Head and Neck Institute, Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Center, Kochi during which period she was involved in setting up the research facility and the establishment of a Head and Neck tissue repository at the center. She is the recipient of the Young Investigator grant from DBT apart from other grants from DBT and ICMR. She is a member of the Head and Neck Cooperative group of India, a consortium involved in collaborative projects in head and neck cancer and member of executive committee of Foundation of Head and Neck Oncology of India. She has presented in multiple national and international conferences and has published in journals such as Translational Oncology, Head & Neck, Genomics, Oral Oncology and Genome Research.

Research Interests

Understanding the mechanisms of carcinogenesis and drug resistance is essential in order to develop clinically viable models that predict susceptibility to tumour development or resistance to treatment. Molecular profiling of head and neck cancers to identify the changes during carcinogenesis and drug resistance, assessing the known markers from the available databases are the main approaches adopted in the lab. Additionally, the role of CSCs in the processes is being explored. Carcinogen induced animal models are the major tool to assess their role in a systematic manner and these studies have already been initiated. CSCs have long been associated with treatment resistance; drug resistant cell lines been developed in the group are being used to delineate the underlying mechanisms.

Publications (Recent)

  • Govindan SV, Kulsum S, Ramanan S, Das D, Seshadri M, Hicks Jr W, Kuriakose MA, Suresh A Establishment and characterization of triple drug resistant head and neck squamous cell carcinoma cell lines. MMR 2014 (Accepted)
  • Baeten J, Suresh A, Johnson A, Kuriakose MA, Flynn A and Kademani D Molecular imaging of oral premalignant and malignant lesions using fluorescently labeled lectins. Translational Oncology 2014 (Accepted)
  • Kekatpure VD, Singh M, Selvam S, Shetkar G, Hedne NC, Trivedi NP, Siddappa G, Govindan SV, Suresh A, Rangarajan B, Dannenberg AJ, Kuriakose MA. Factors Predicting Outcome Following Salvage Treatment for Stage IV Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma: Evidence of the Potential Importance of the COX-2-Prostaglandin E2 Pathway. Head Neck. 2014 Apr 25. doi: 10.1002/hed.23721
  • Elango JK, Suresh A, Elango EM, Lakshmi S, Hiran KR, Sundaram K, Kuriakose MA. Role of Human Papilloma Virus in Oral Tongue Squamous Cell Carcinoma. As Pac J Can prev 2011; 12(4):889-96.
  • Elango JK, Anandkrishnan N, Suresh A, Iyer SK, Sundaram K R, Kuriakose MA Mouth Self-Examination to improve oral cancer awareness and early detection in a high-risk population Oral Oncol. 2011 Jul; 47(7):620-4. Epub 2011 Jun 8.
  • Suresh A, Vannan M, Dhanya K, Priya S, Elango EM, Thangaraj K and Kuriakose MA. Resistance Response Molecular Signature for Oral Tongue Squamous Cell Carcinoma Disease markers 31 (2011) 1-14
  • Vallinayagam S, Jehan Z, Pradhan S, Hemakumar R, Suresh A, Sridevi R, Ahuja YR, Singh L and Rachel AJ. Novel non-coding RNA from human Y distal heterochromatic block (Yq12) generates testis-specific chimeric Cdc2L2. Genome Research, 2007; 17 (4):433-40.
  • Suresh A, Shah V, Rani DS, Singh BN, UmaPrasad G, Subramanian S, Kumar S and Singh L. A mouse gene encoding a novel member of the WD family of proteins is highly conserved and predominantly expressed in the testis (Wdr13). Molecular Reproduction and Development 72 (2005) 299-310.
  • Singh BN, Suresh A, UmaPrasad G, Subramanian S, Sultana M, Goel S, Kumar S, and Singh L. A highly conserved human gene encoding a novel member of WD-repeat family of proteins (WDR13). Genomics 81 (2003) 315–328.