Chidambaram Ramanathan
Circadian biologist at the University of Memphis who showed that mTOR signalling sets the speed and strength of the body's daily clocks
Research Associate Professor, College of Health Sciences, University of Memphis · postdoc in circadian functional genomics, University of Memphis · postdoc on the neural basis of day-active behaviour, Michigan State University · PhD, Madurai Kamaraj University (2002)
College of Health Sciences, University of Memphis (Memphis, Tennessee, USA) ↗
Chidambaram (Chida) Ramanathan is the first author of RAM2018, a PLoS Genetics paper from Andrew Liu's group at the University of Memphis. Almost every cell runs a circadian clock, a set of genes that switch each other on and off over about 24 hours. A master clock in the brain, the SCN, keeps the clocks in organs such as the liver in step. The study started from the observation that mTOR activity itself rises and falls over the day, and asked whether mTOR also feeds back on the clock.
It does. Blocking mTOR made the clock run slower, with a longer period, and weaker, with a flatter rhythm. Turning mTOR up did the reverse. The team saw this in cultured cells, in slices of SCN and liver taken from mice, and in living mice with only one working copy of the mTOR gene, whose daily activity cycle ran longer. This links the cell's main nutrient and growth sensor to the timing of daily rhythms, though the evidence comes from cells and mice.
Ramanathan earned a PhD at Madurai Kamaraj University in India in 2002, then worked as a postdoc at Michigan State University on the brain basis of being active by day, and at the University of Memphis on circadian functional genomics. Ramanathan is now a research associate professor in the College of Health Sciences at the University of Memphis, studying how circadian clocks and their output signals interact with cell metabolism, oxidative stress and ageing.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | A | mTOR signaling regulates central and peripheral circadian clock function RAM2018 First author: showed in cells, mouse tissue slices and mTOR heterozygous mice that mTOR activity sets the period and amplitude of central and peripheral circadian clocks. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 2
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Chidambaram Ramanathan.
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- Andrew C. Liu Circadian biologist who studies how the body clock works at the molecular level and how it connects with metabolism and signalling pathways such as mTOR.
- John B. Hogenesch Circadian-rhythm geneticist who uses genome-wide methods to map which genes the body clock controls in each tissue.
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