Shabarinath Srikumar

EDUCATION

• 2007 Ph.D. — College of Fisheries, Karnataka, Veterinary, Animal Sciences and Fisheries University, India
• 2003 M.F.Sc (Master of Fishery Science) — College of Fisheries, University of Agricultural Sciences, India
• 2001 B.F.Sc — College of Fisheries, Kerala Agricultural University, India

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

• 2023-present, Assistant Professor — Department of Poultry Science, College of Agriculture, Auburn University
• 2019-2023, Assistant Professor — Department of Food Science, College of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine, UAE University
• 2015-2019, Senior Research Fellow — University College Dublin, Ireland
• 2011-2014, Postdoctoral Fellow — Trinity College Dublin, Ireland & University of Liverpool, UK
• 2011-2011, Postdoctoral Fellow — VRISD, San Diego, CA, USA
• 2009-2010, Postdoctoral Fellow — ZIEL, Abteilung Mikrobiologie, TUM, Germany
• 2006-2009, Research Associate — College of Fisheries, Mangalore, India
• 2003-2006, Research Associate — College of Fisheries, Mangalore, India

HONORS & AWARDS

• University Gold Medal – Best outgoing Ph.D student (Fishery Microbiology), Karnataka Veterinary Animal and Fishery Sciences – 2005-2006.
• University Gold Medal – Best outgoing Masters Student (Fishery Microbiology), University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore – 2003-2004.

Dr. Srikumar’s research focuses on understanding how pathogenic bacteria survive and proliferate in poultry meat and environment. Studying the pathogen-food interactions at a molecular level will allow deep insights into how pathogenic bacteria alters its metabolic and regulatory profiles during adaptation to the different poultry environments. To this end, we will use different nucleic acid sequencing-based and other molecular microbiological assays on Salmonella Typhimurium (and other select serotypes) as model organism (s). Our goal is to develop data that will futuristically aid development of novel technologies aimed at making food safer.

RESEARCH INTERESTS

• Microbial Pathogenesis
• Host Microbial Interaction
• Foodborne Bacterial Ecology

• POUL 5160 – Principles of Food Safety
• POUL 6160 – Advanced Principles of Food Safety

SELECT PUBLICATIONS

• Greeshma Bharathan, Sunil Mundra, Dania Mustafa Darwich, Maitha Mohammad Saeed, Ahad Saeed Ali Al Hafri, Maitha Mohammed Saeed Musabbeh Alsalmi, Sajid Maqsood, Priti Mudgil, Séamus Fanning, and Shabarinath Srikumar. 2023. Regulation of iron metabolism is critical for the survival of Salmonella Typhimurium in pasteurized milk. Food Microbiology. 115C: 104326. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fm.2023.104326
• Yu Cao, Katherine Dever, Sathesh Kumar Sivasankaran, Guerrino Macori, Ankita Naithani, Gopal Gopinathrao, Ben Tall, Angelika Lehner, Roger Stephan, Shabarinath Srikumar, and Séamus Fanning. Alterations in the transcriptional landscape allows differential desiccation tolerance in different strains of Cronobacter sakazakii. Applied and Environmental Microbiology 87:e00830-21. https://doi.org/10.1128/AEM.00830-21
• João Anes, Katherine Dever, Athmanya Eshwar, Scott Nguyen, Yu Cao, Sathesh K Sivasankaran, Sandra Sakalauskaitė, Angelika Lehner, Stéphanie Devineau, Rimantas Daugelavičius, Séamus Fanning and Shabarinath Srikumar. Analysis of the oxidative stress regulon identifies soxS as a genetic target for resistance reversal in multi-drug resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae. mBIO 12:e00867-21.
  https://doi.org/10.1128/mbio.00867-21
• Shabarinath Srikumar, Yu Cao, Qiongqiong Yan, Shane Cooney, Gopal R. Gopinath, Ben D. Tall, Sathesh Kumar Sivasankaran, Karsten Hokamp, Angelika Lehner, Roger Stephan, and Séamus Fanning. RNA sequencing based Transcriptional overview of xerotolerance in Cronobacter sakazakii. Applied and Environmental Microbiology 85 (3): e01993-18. https://doi.org/10.1128/AEM.01993-18
• Shabarinath Srikumar, Carsten Kröger, Magali Hébrard, Aoife Colgan, Siân V. Owen, Sathesh K Sivasankaran, Andrew D. S. Cameron, Karsten Hokamp, and Jay C. D. Hinton. RNA-seq Brings New Insights to the Intra-Macrophage Transcriptome of Salmonella Typhimurium. PLoS Pathogens 11(11); e1005262. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.ppat.1005262