Anique Ahmad, grad student from our lab, was one of the eight finalist to showcase his thesis in three minute.

August 2024: GHG PI, Aashish Jha and Graduate Student, Anique Ahmad, attended this year ISME conference held in Cape Town, South Africa. Anique presented his research on Falcons which was recently published. His paper shows that falcon gut microbiota is shaped by diet.

July 2024: GHG lab members attended this year's SMBE conference held in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Rahgavi Poopolarajah, post doc from GHG presented her work on gut resistome. Nada Elsharkawy, capstone student from GHG did a poster presentation on her research in Iranian populations.

The ISME ECSC is spotlighting Anique Ahmad (https://lnkd.in/g6rbbY7v), a New York University/New York University Abu Dhabi PhD student, and his paper “Falcon gut microbiota is shaped by diet and enriched in Salmonella.”

https://lnkd.in/gf9p4ccH

Anique’s paper shows the crucial role of diet and evolutionary history in shaping the gut microbiota of falcons, revealing significant health implications and the need for pathogen screening in these birds.

Aashish has been cited in the article titled “7 Biggest Reveals From Netflix’s ‘Hack Your Health: The Secrets of Your Gut’”.

Aashish is a part of a new informative documentary "Hack Your Health: The Secrets Of Your Gut" directed by Anjali Nayer on Netflix. He provides insight on how valuable it is to understand the gut microbiome of traditional populations to understand the overall microbiome. It features our ongoing work in traditional Nepali populations.

Press release

February 2024: Posters submitted by two researchers in the lab, Mark Penjueli (Research Assistant) and Sophiya Paudel (Student Research Assistant) were selected for flash talks at the CGSB conference organized at NYUAD .

A poster titled "The “Hunter Gatherers” of Nepal and their Transformations", by Sophiya Paudel, Sophomore Student at NYUAD was voted as one of the best posters at the CGSB XII.

December 2023: Adib Choudhury from GHG recently was awarded Undergraduate Research Fund Grant for the Fall 2023. He will use the award for his proposal “Understanding how gut microbiome development in infants across a spectrum of human subsistence affects health outcomes.”

November 2023: Rita Fahmy, Tsedenia Denekew and Mark Penjueli from GHG attended ASHG 2023 conference held in Washington DC. Rita got an opportunity to present her work while Mark and Tsedenia presented posters at the conference.

October 25: Aashish describes how critical it is to study nomadic group such as Raute to understand how the Himalaya was first settled.

July 2023: GHG members, Aashish, Ahmed, Anique, Yoshina, Tsedenia, Mark and Arya attended SMBE Conference in Ferrara, Italy. They also presented their work at the conference.

Rita Fahmy (Capstone 2023) received a Post-graduation Research Fellowship* from the Center for Genomics and Systems Biology (CGSB) at New York University Abu Dhabi to continue her work with the Genetic Heritage Group. This prestigious one-year fellowship was inaugurated this year and will be awarded to one graduating senior each year whose research closely aligns with the CGSB’s mission of engaging in innovative research in response to ever-present local challenges, particularly under the research themes of Biomedicine and Health or Environmental Adaptation and Sustainability. Using various bioinformatics platforms and computational techniques, Rita’s research will explore the genetic histories, architecture, and potential positive selection events that may be conferring health-based adaptations in lower-altitude Himalayan populations, which have been rather under-studied and underrepresented in the field of genomics.

Our PI Aashish was interviewed by student run podcast eARThumanities: Reimagining Net-Zero project (NYU Abu Dhabi). It is a new initiative that proposes a dynamic way of thinking about a just and inclusive development paradigm for a net-zero world.

June 2023: Our PI Aashish’s interview was featured in Nature. His interview is about how our research group is integrating fieldwork with broader social-health initiatives and advocacy efforts, and how he balances the roles of researcher and public-health advocate.

June 2023: Nature News highlighted our work on Nepali populations. The study compares the sequenced gut microbiomes from Hadza people and compared them to the people in Nepal and California.

A paper published from our group led by a Capstone Student, Tsedenia Denekew (2022), “Prevalence and determinants of hypertension in underrepresented indigenous populations of Nepal” has been selected to appear in the PLOS Showcase on Kudos. This ensures that our article reaches more people - not only academics but also 1000s of influential researchers, policymakers, journalists, and funders worldwide.

Another poster summarizing Mark Penjueli’s research on Himalayan populations, titled "Insights into the genetic diversity of himalayan populations", was voted as one of the best posters at the ADNAT2023, an international conference organized by Banaras Hindu University in Varaasi, India.

March 2023: GHG members, Aashish, Easwar and Mark attended ANDAT conference in Banaras Hindu University at Varanasi, India.

February 2023: Posters submitted by two researchers in the lab, Anique Ahmed (Research Assistant) and Eaaswar Muthukrishnan (Research Scientist), were selected for flash talks at the CGSB conference organized at NYUAD

A poster titled "The Polynesian Settlement of the Hawaiian Archipelago", presented by Mark Penjueli, a former Capstone Student and currently a Research Assistant in our Group, was voted as one of the best posters at the CGSB conference organized at NYUAD.

October 2022: Arya Gautam, capstone student from GHG, writes about the need to recognize the issue of underrepresentation of certain populations in scientific research, and make conscious efforts to facilitate their inclusion.

October 2022: Aashish is appointed Senior Ambassador at ISME Microbes . His role is effective for four years.

August 2022, Lausanne, Switzerland : Aashish Jha (PI), Ahmed Shibl, Arya Gautam, Tsedenia Denekew and Yoshina Gautam of Genetic Heritage Lab Group attended ISME18 conference. Lab members also presented their posters.

Tsedenia Denekew (Capstone 2022) received a Post-graduation Research Fellowship* from New York University Abu Dhabi to continue her work at Genetic Heritage Group. This prestigious one-year fellowship at NYUAD is awarded to two graduating seniors from each division and allows them to propose and execute research in their fields of interest. Her research will look into a variety of host factors/phenotypes and uses 16S rRNA and metagemonic sequencing to explore their association to microbial diversity and richness of the oral microbiome in the Emirati population.

In an article titled “Hunter Gatherer’s Gut Bacteria Might Show History of Our Microbiome”, Saugat writes about differences in gut microbiome in hunter-gather communities and industrial nations. Difference in gut start to emerge as early as six months.

The Denekew et al. PGPH. 2022 paper was featured by several media outlets. We thank Al Ittihad, Al Watan and Al Wahda for featuring our article in print. We are grateful to WAM, Al Ittihad, Al Khaleej, Al Wahda, Nabd, akwadon, and The World News for featuring our paper in Arabic. We are thankful to WAM, Khaleej Times, Medicalxpress, Write Caliber, Khaleej Report, Open Access, Scienmag, and Mirage news for featuring our paper in English.

In an article titled “In Collecting Indigenous Feces, A Slew of Sticky Ethics”, Katherine writes a segment about our work on Himalayan gut microbiome featuring an interview with Aashish.