Shubham Maurya, PhD, is a postdoctoral scholar with extensive experience in engineering viral vectors for gene therapy and employing cutting-edge ""omics"" techniques for identifying novel targets and mechanisms in neuro-ophthalmic diseases. He received his PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur in 2020, where he was part of a collaborative study aimed at identifying post-translational modifications of adeno-associated virus vector capsid proteins. During his doctoral studies, he worked on engineering capsids that lack these modifications as a way to improve their efficiency.
His contributions to the field include generating and characterizing mutant virus vectors that have been specifically altered for durability and were used in gene therapy for hemophilia B and Leber congenital amaurosis 2 using lab models. He also used exosome-associated mutant adeno-associated virus vectors for their efficiency in ocular transduction, the conversion of light signals to nerve cell signals to the brain. In another collaborative project, Dr. Maurya and his team used exosome-associated adeno-associated virus vectors as a platform technology for so-called suicide gene therapy in a lab model of hepatocellular carcinoma, which showed promising results in significant loss of cancer cell survival.
Dr. Maurya is currently a postdoctoral scholar at the Herbert Wertheim School of Optometry at the University of California, Berkeley, where he is exploring novel neuroprotective targets to treat or prevent glaucoma.