Following undergraduate and post-graduate education in Biotechnology/Bioinformatics at Bangalore University in India and a year training as a Junior Research Fellow at the Indian Institute of Science, Praveen completed a PhD in Computation Biology and Bioinformatics at University College Dublin, Republic of Ireland. Praveen’s PhD was a joint appointment with the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and he was affiliated to The William Harvey Research Institute – Barts and The London and Imperial College London, Saint Mary’s Campus. During his PhD, Praveen also obtained a visiting fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School supported by the Irish Research Council for Science Engineering and Technology (IRCSET).
After his PhD, Praveen joined the Cardiovascular Epidemiology Unit (CEU), Department of Public Health and Primary Care, University of Cambridge as a Research Associate (Genetic Statistician). In February 2018, Praveen obtained Rurtherford Fund Fellowship at HDR-UK and in June 2020, he was promoted as a Senior Research Associate at University of Cambridge.
Praveen’s research focus on the discovering novel bimolecular pathways associated with Cardiometabolic diseases (CMDs) using intermediate phenotypes including metabolites, glycans and proteins. Currently Praveen co-lead 1. The metabolome Genetic Architecture Programme (mGAP) focused on the identification of genetic variants (genotyped or imputed using SNP arrays) associated with metabolites measured using non-targetted metabolomics and 2. INTERVAL Flagship project focused on identifying genes and genetic variants associated with ~6,000 biomolecular phenotypes measured through whole exome and whole genome sequencing within the INTERVAL Bioresource. In the past Praveen led various research projects, primarily on cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) and blood pressure (BP) identifying novel biomolecular pathways and mechanisms associated with these complex phenotypes. For example, in 2016, Praveen and colleagues identified 30 new blood pressure- or hypertension-associated genetic regions in a trans-ancestry meta-analyses, including 3 rare missense variants in RBM47, COL21A1 and RRAS with larger effects (>1.5 mm Hg/allele) a low-frequency nonsense variant in ENPEP association with blood pressure regulation in the Renin-Angiotensin-Aldosterone System (RAAS). Praveen currently co-lead the largest genetic study of blood pressure involving ~1.3 million individuals from 92 studies across the globe. In addition to his core research activities, Praveen provide extensive support to CEU’s high performance computing, act as the scientific coordinator of HDR UK Cambridge seminar series and data manager for the CHD Exome+ consortium hosted at the CEU.
