Dr. Jayaram joined IIT Delhi as a faculty in the Chemistry Department in 1990. Prior to this, he obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the City University of New York (1986) under the guidance of Prof. David Beveridge, a renowned quantum chemist and one of the world’s leading experts in DNA modeling. Dr. Jayaram’s thesis work was concerned with developing methodologies to model nucleic acid constituents at atomic level under aqueous conditions on what was then one of the largest computer installations of IBM in mid-town Manhattan.
After his Ph.D., he took up a Post Doctoral assignment with Prof. Barry Honig, a pioneer in Biomolecular Electrostatics and Bioinformatics, at Columbia University, USA. Dr. Jayaram’s contributions on electrostatics of DNA have eventually found their way into Delphi software. Subsequently he worked as a Senior Research Associate with Prof. Beveridge at Wesleyan University where he developed methodologies to help understand the energetics of Biomolecular recognition.
At IIT Delhi, he started building the infrastructure to carry out biomolecular modeling and creating the necessary science and software pursuing the dream of developing in silico solutions for personalized medicine. A result of these efforts is the Supercomputing Facility for Bioinformatics & Computational Biology (SCFBio) at IIT Delhi, and the Gene to Drug suite of softwares, made freely accessible to the global scientific user community.
Jay as he is known, believes that language of DNA is close to being deciphered, that the protein folding problem, the holy grail of molecular biology, unsolved for the last 60 years, would find a solution soon and that computers would generate reliable lead molecules to fight disease. A flutist by passion and a long distance runner, he is proud of being instrumental in creating Children’s parks in IIT Delhi.
- Co-Chair, Data Management Committee, DBT (2024-2027).
- Mentor, Supercomputing Facility for Bioinformatics & Computational Biology, IIT Delhi.
- Emeritus Professor, Department of Chemistry, IITD (July, 2019-Sept., 2023).
- Professor, Department of Chemistry & Kusuma School of Biological Sciences, IIT Delhi.
- Founder Coordinator, Kusuma School of Biological Sciences, IIT Delhi (2008-2014).
- Head, Department of Chemistry, IIT Delhi (Sept. 2006- Aug. 2009).
- Coordinator, Supercomputing Facility for Bioinformatics & Computational Biology, IIT Delhi.
- Senior Research Associate, Wesleyan University, USA (1989-90).
- Post Doctoral Fellow, Columbia University, USA (1987-88).
- Ph.D. (Chemistry), City University of New York, USA (1982-1986).
- Recipient of IBM Faculty Award (2014-2015).
- Recipient of Chemical Research Society of India (CRSI) Medal (2000).
- Recognized as one of the top five bioinformaticians in the country by Bioinformatics Review (2018).
- Vice President, Indian Biophysical Society (2006-2008).
- Chairman, DBT's committee on promotion and popularization of Biotechnology (2009-2013).
- Member of the National Task Force on Bioinformatics, Department of Biotechnology (DBT) (till 2009 & 2014 onwards).
- Member of the Bioinformatics Task Force, Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) (2012-2013).
- Member of Physical Chemistry Programme Advisory Committee, DST (2004-2007).
- Member of Organic Chemistry Programme Advisory Committee, DST (2007-2011).
- Member of Biophysics, Biochemistry & Molecular Biology PAC, DST (2012-2014).
- Member of FIST Committee for Chemical Sciences, DST (2009-2011).
- Member of the Working Group on Bioinformatics, Department of Information Technology (2007-2011).
- Member of the National Committee of IUPAB (2008-2011).
- Member of the Editorial Board of Journal of Molecular Graphics & Modeling (2009-2011).
Research Focus
The Dhanvantari Journey: From Genomes to Drugs
Core Interest: Biomolecular modeling and simulation in relation to Genome Analysis, Protein Structure Prediction, and Drug Design.
During his Dhanvantari (Genome→Gene→Protein→Drug pathway) scientific journey, Prof. Jayaram with his students and colleagues made several important discoveries. One was the conjugate rule among nucleic acid bases which explained degeneracies in genetic code and paved the way for a physico-chemical approach to genome annotation. This was followed by their discovery that energetic and structural properties of DNA sequences conveyed their functional destiny. Most notably, their studies demonstrated that the "sequence to structure and dynamics to function" axiom was true for nucleic acids as well as proteins.
On the protein front, they discovered that just four physico-chemical properties of amino acids explained the existence of the "magic number 20" for naturally occurring amino acids. They also found that millions of proteins share a similar stoichiometry in their amino acid compositions, which they called the "margin of life," and that there was a universality in the spatial distribution of the C-alpha atoms. Their analyses suggested that protein folding was a convergent problem, a concept now proven by AlphaFold. The Sanjeevini software suite they built for computer-aided drug discovery has delivered experimentally validated molecules against HAV, HBV, CHIKV, fungal infections, breast cancer, and malaria.
Read more details in the full profile PDFKey Contributions
Pioneering Software Suites
Developed Chemgenome, Bhageerath & Sanjeevini for genome annotation, protein structure prediction, and drug design.
National Supercomputing Facility
Established a multi-teraflop supercomputing facility (SCFBio) at IIT Delhi, making it freely accessible to the global scientific community.
Mentorship & Impact
Guided 27+ PhDs, published over 150 papers, and founded/facilitated two deep-tech startup companies.