Pramod Pantha, Ph.D.

Welcome to the Pramod Pantha's Scientific Portfolio page. I' m dedicated to understanding the molecular mechanisms of plant adaptation to extreme environments. I use molecular biology and comparative transcriptome/genomics tools to carry out cutting-edge research that advances our understanding of plant adaptation to harsh environment.

My Overarching Research Goal

I am a computational and molecular biologist who studies how plants can survive in an extreme environmental condition using physiological, multi-omics data, and modern molecular biology tools. The overarching goal of my research is to understand the molecular mechanisms of plants’ survival under extreme environmental conditions. Those plants can be used as genetic repositories to improve crop plants amidst climate crisis we are facing. Most of the crop plants (>99% of all plants) that we are growing today are sensitive to most of the environmental stresses for example, high salt, drought, cold, flooding, low nutrients etc which directly threatens the food security. Food security problem is further exacerbated by the growing world population. My work has practical applications in improving crop productivity and feeding the increasing world population.

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News & Events

Organized workshop on “Management of Invasive Species in Wetlands”, April, 2024; Link for news

Received AGBT-Ag 2024 Next Generation Leadership Award, April 16, 2024

Bulk RNA-seq data analysis workshop Jan 30-Feb 8th, 2024

Presenting at NSF headquarter on October 10th, 2023

13. Received AGBT-Ag 2024 Next Generation Leadership Award, April 16, 2024

12. Organized a workshop on “Management of Invasive Species in Wetlands”, April 12th, 2024 at LSU with invited speakers from USGS and Army Corps of Engineers. Link for news

11. Presented our work on Brassicaceae extremophyte genomics at Department of Energy (DOE), Genomic Sciences Program PI Meeting April 2-5, 2024.

10. Conducted workshop for graduate students on "Hands-on experience on Bulk RNA-seq analysis pipeline" Jan 30- Feb 8th, 2024 at LSU.

9. Presented Phragmites genomics work at PAG31, Jan 11-17th, 204, San Diego, CA: Link

8. Gave talk at EDGE-NSF annual meeting on October 10-11, 2023

7. Schrenkiella parvula lifestyle paper is published on August, 2023 in The Plant Journal: Link

6. First author profile published at the Plantae: Link

5. Gave talk at ISBioTech, March 20-22, 2023 on "A tale of two transcriptomic responses in agricultural pests via host defenses and viral replication". Link

4. Gave talk at Plant and Animal Genome Conference Jan 12-18, 2023 on "Genomic insights into the invasiveness of Phragmites australis (common reed) in comparison with non-invasive native genotype. Link

3. Growing Crops when Challenged by Climate Change, Saturday Science @ LSU at EBR Main Library, October 29, 2022. Talk shared with Dr. Maheshi Dassanayake

2. Won Graduate Travel Grant to attend American Society of Plant Biologist meeting at Montreal, Canada. Link

1. Won best oral presentation award at American Society of Plant Biologist-Southern Section (ASPB-SS) meeting, March 24-26, 2018. Link