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Scientist, Passionate about improving human health by unlocking the power of the genome.

Dr Sivasubbu’s research interests are focused on sequencing human genomes for adoption and benefit in healthcare. He has led flagship programs including the first whole human genome sequencing initiative in India, which was then scaled up to India’s first 1000 whole human genomes encompassing representative ethnic groups. He also led international collaborative human genomics initiatives aimed at understanding the Asian genome diversity through sequencing of the first human genomes from Malaysia and Sri Lanka. Realizing the potential biomedical applications of genomic sciences, he and Dr Vinod Scaria co-founded a clinical collaborative network - Genomics for Understanding Rare Disease: India Alliance Network (GUaRDIAN), which is one of the largest precision medicine ecosystem in India working on rare genetic diseases. His work has benefited patients and families suffering from intractable genetic diseases specific to India by providing precise genetic diagnosis, prompt genetic counselling and prenatal testing, where required. His work has provided affordable, accessible and equitable genetic testing to a large number of patients in India, while benefiting a wide range of stakeholders including clinicians, hospitals, research institutions, diagnostic laboratories and biotech industries.

His group develops zebrafish models for application in precision medicine in humans. His laboratory also explores non-coding RNA mediated regulation of vascular development and diseases, wherein his group is credited with the discovery of a number of non-coding RNAs.

Dr. Sivasubbu's team led the first global field testing for the Illumina developed COVIDSeq assay on SARS-CoV2 clinical samples. The success of this work became the basis for adoption of COVIDSeq in over 210 countries for genomic surveillance of SARS-CoV2. His team’s work on developing “accelerated genome sequencing” on bench-top NGS platforms was adopted by WHO-SEARO for genome surveillance of SARS-CoV2. Dr. Sivasubbu served as the chief scientific officer of The Center for Genomic Application. Dr. Sivasubbu’s group has developed multiple genomics assays and tools, which have been transferred to various healthcare companies. Dr. Sivasubbu has contributed richly to the research field by publishing over 161 internationally peer reviewed articles.

Dr. Sridhar Sivasubbu was a Chief Scientist at the CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (CSIR-IGIB), Delhi, India until Aug 2023. He served as the Head of “Genomics and Molecular Medicine Unit” and the Head of “Business Development” at CSIR-IGIB. Dr. Sivasubbu completed his PhD from M.S University, Tirunelveli, India and postdoctoral research from the CSIR-Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology, India and the University of Minnesota, USA, with specializations in genetics and genomics.