People
Current Lab Members
Kartik Rajagopalan, M.D., Ph.D.
Position: Principal Investigator | Email Dr. Rajagopalan
Dr. Kartik Rajagopalan is a physician-scientist and Assistant Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine, and a member of the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at UT Southwestern. He specializes in medical critical care.
Dr. Rajagopalan earned his medical and doctoral degrees at UT Southwestern where he studied metabolic fluxes during cell proliferation in the lab of Dr. Ralph DeBerardinis. He then completed his Internal Medicine Residency and Pulmonary and Critical-care Fellowship at Columbia University in New York. He performed post-doctoral work understanding the role of leptin signaling during influenza and COVID infection in the lab of Dr. Jeffrey Friedman at Rockefeller University.
He returned to UT Southwestern to start a faculty position and laboratory in September of 2023.
When not in the laboratory, Kartik continues to practice medicine as an intensivist.
Tadiwanashe Gwatiringa
Position: Research Assistant/Lab Manager | Email Tadiwanashe
With a solid academic foundation and a visionary approach to health and society, Tadiwanashe is on a trajectory towards making a substantial impact in the medical field.
Tadiwanashe holds a bachelor's degree in human biology, health, and society from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.
She is on a pre-med academic track to pursue a combined MD/PhD which she intends to use to deepen her knowledge and understanding of health disparities, with the goal of devising strategies that contribute significantly to improving healthcare access and outcomes for underserved communities.
Mahalakshmi Aranganathan
Position: Research Technician | Email Mahalakshmi
Mahalakshmi Aranganathan earned her B.Tech in Biotechnology from VIT, completing a fellowship at IIT Madras investigating the tumor suppressor RASSF8 in breast cancer and gaining experience in molecular biology and cell‑based assays. As Indus Biotech, she conducted virtual screening, molecular docking, and dynamics simulations for Alzheimer’s targets. She then completed her M.S. in Bioinformatics at UT Dallas, studying bistable gene switch mechanisms driving metastasis.
Now a research technician at UT Southwestern, she investigates how the brain regulates energy balance and immune function during infection. Her research interests include metabolism, neuroimmunology, molecular network dynamics, and data‑driven approaches to understanding complex physiological processes, with long‑term goals of advancing translational biomedical research.
Soumya Kamath, M.S.
Position: Graduate Student | Email Soumya
Soumya is originally from North Carolina, where she earned her B.S. in Biology with a minor in Hispanic Studies at East Carolina University. She remained at her alma mater to pursue an M.S. in Biomedical Sciences, joining the Department of Integrated Physiology and Metabolism. Her master’s thesis focused on the mechanisms of female pelvic floor and genitourinary function in relation to Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.
Her interest in metabolism brought her to UT Southwestern in the fall of 2024, where she is pursuing a Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences in the Cell and Molecular Biology program, with a track in Molecular Mechanisms of Metabolic Diseases. Soumya’s current research focuses on investigating lipolysis as a protective immune response in the context of sepsis.
Danny Litty
Position: Student Intern | Email Danny
Danny Litty is an undergraduate student at the University of Texas at Dallas pursuing a major in Neuroscience and a minor in Healthcare Management. He joined the lab with the interest of learning more about the intersection between energy regulation with immune responses within the lens of a pulmonary and critical care lab. After graduation, Danny plans to attend medical school in order to serve underserved populations in surrounding communities, while addressing and raising awareness of preexisting healthcare disparities.
Lab Alumni
| Name | Position | Year(s) | Current Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| Catherine Pontius | Research Technician | 2024 | Bioassay Scientist at Eurofins |
| David Bautista | Post-doctoral Fellow | 2025 | Adjunct Professor at Tarrant County Community College |
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