Why are black or pseudomelanistic tigers only found in Similipal tiger reserve, India? What is causing the reappearance of long-lost rare colouration phenotypes like golden and white in wild tiger populations? I am interested in colouration phenotypes in tigers, their genetic and evolutionary drivers, and their implications for individual and population health. My research involves identifying the genetic mutation associated with disruption-of-stripes or pseudomelanistic phenotype, investigating the evolutionary drivers of white, golden and pseudomelanistic phenotypes in wild tiger populations, and understanding the potential loss of function mutations contributing to inbreeding depression often associated with captive populations of rare coloured tigers.

Research Interest
I am interested in looking at how habitat fragmentation affects the spatial distribution of genetic variation in mammals. Global patterns of habitat fragmentation and connectivity for mammalian carnivores reveal that while the Indian sub-continent has high species richness, it also has a high level of habitat fragmentation and isolation. Rapid economic and human demographic growth have lead to severe habitat loss creating progressively smaller patches or islands of suitable habitat located in a hostile and heterogeneous matrix. I am using genetic tools and theory-based simulations to investigate how different mammal species are affected by habitat fragmentation in the Central Indian Highlands and how this connectivity may change in the future in face of development.

Runs the Poodle lab at IISc

Research Interest
I am interested in studying the evolutionary history of natural populations and in understanding how genetic variation in a population is shaped by processes such as migration and selection over time. So far, I have been working on tigers, a species that has been subjected to a severe population bottleneck in the past due to hunting and habitat decline. While once they were distributed across much of the country, today they are largely restricted to small protected areas. My work involved the use of genomics (ddRAD sequencing) to understand genetic differentiation among tiger populations across India. We also worked on developing an improved method to identify individual tigers from fecal samples using single nucleotide polymorphism markers.