Professor Himanshu Sinha from the Department of Biotechnology at IIT Madras, and a distinguished alumnus of Punjab Agricultural University (PAU), delivered a thought-provoking lecture in the University’s Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics.
The PAU Vice-Chancellor Dr Satbir Singh Gosal attended the session and highlighted Prof Sinha’s impressive journey from PAU to Cambridge, and then to IIT Madras. He noted that Prof Sinha’s work reflected a strong scientific foundation built at PAU and expressed interest in future collaborations.
Prof Sinha’s talk, titled ‘Bridging the Gap between Variant to Function for Genetic Interactions through Integrative Multiomics Approaches,’ walked the audience through how his research group used yeast as a model system to understand the effects of genetic variants. He explained how individual variants shaped simple traits, how interactions among them influenced more complex outcomes, and why these insights mattered for studying both crops and human health. He also spoke about the growing contribution of Artificial Intelligence and machine learning in decoding genetic mechanisms, making it possible to analyze large datasets and reveal patterns that were previously difficult to detect.
He shared how his academic path began at PAU, where he completed his master’s degree under Dr Manjit Singh Gill and Dr Satbir Singh Gosal, before pursuing his Ph.D at the University of Cambridge. At IIT Madras, he now leads an interdisciplinary team working on population genetics and integrative multiomics. He is also affiliated with the Wadhwani School of Data Science and AI, where he helps develop data-driven tools for healthcare. One of his group’s recent milestones is India’s first gestational age prediction model based on fetal biometry, currently being tested through a nationwide clinical trial. As Head of the Centre for Integrative Biology and Systems Medicine, he also leads the IIT Madras team in the GenomeIndia Project, which completed sequencing of 10,000 human genomes and is expected to support advances in precision medicine.
The event drew faculty, students and researchers from across PAU, including Dr Yogesh Vikal, Director, School of Agricultural Biotechnology; and Dr Satinder Kaur, Director, Gurdev Singh Khush Institute of Genetics, Plant Breeding and Biotechnology.
Dr Satwinder Kaur Dhillon, Head, Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, proposed a vote of thanks. The session was coordinated by Dr Dharminder Bhatia, Quantitative Geneticist.