Siddharth S. Matikonda, Ph.D.

I have been working on an NIH postdoctoral fellowship in the Schnermann lab at the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health (NIH), since January 2018. My research spans the areas of cancer diagnostics and therapeutics. My major areas of interest over the last four years have been;

1. Engineering Antibody Drug Conjugates (ADCs) to tackle various drawbacks in the current state-of-the-art cancer therapy.

2. Developing diagnostic tools that operate in the near-infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum. 

3. Understanding the photophysical properties of the developed new generation of red-shifted fluorophores.

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My doctoral research at the University of Otago, Dunedin (NZ), in the Gamble group, involved developing bioorthogonal chemistries for click-to-release based prodrug activation strategies. The overarching aim was to address the extremely narrow therapeutic index and various off-target side effects of the current chemotherapy.

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In 2012, I worked on my undergraduate thesis by research at the Altman lab at the University of Kansas, KS (USA). Here, I was involved in developing the chemical methodology to synthesize fluoroalkene peptidomimetics for medicinal chemistry applications. Prior to my honors thesis, I was involved in three projects in the Dharmarajan lab and the Perumal lab at BITS Pilani, India. These med-chem projects in the areas of tuberculosis and neurological pain laid a strong background in chemical synthesis.