Researchers from the School of Biotechnology at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, Mr. Hemender Singh and Dr. Swarkar Sharma, recently participated in the 23rd Annual Convention of ADNAT and International Conference on Precision Medicine held at Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi from March 10th to 13th, 2023. The conference brought together 310 delegates from 17 states in India and 20 international speakers from 13 countries, featuring a total of 40 invited lectures and 70 poster presentations of high quality. Mr. Hemender Singh presented his Ph.D. research work conducted under the guidance of Dr. Swarkar Sharma and Dr. Ekta Rai at SMVDU. His research, which is the first-ever genetic study of Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis (a spinal disorder) in India, showed an association between developmental and bone morphogenetic pathway genes and Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis pathogenesis. Based on his work, Mr. Hemender was selected as a candidate for the prestigious Dr. PM Bhargava Award for the conference and won the first prize in the poster presentation. During the conference, Dr. Swarkar Sharma delivered an invited talk on precision medicine and the extensive work of the Human Genetics Research Group (HGRG) in the population of Jammu and Kashmir. In his talk, Dr. Sharma emphasized the gaps in genetic studies in Jammu and Kashmir due to limited resources and trained manpower in the region. He shared the research designs developed by HGRG to overcome these challenges and facilitate genetics research with the objective of precision medicine in the region. Dr. Sharma also presented an online open-access database, www.jkdna.in, created by the group for the use of researchers, scientists, and clinicians worldwide, to utilize human genomics data for healthcare research and the benefits of humankind.
