Aditya Bandekar

Aditya Bandekar is a postdoctoral research fellow working jointly in the laboratories of Yonatan Grad at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Ethan Garner in Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard University. His research focuses on understanding the unique growth and division mechanisms of Neisseria gonorrhoeae, the bacterium responsible for gonorrhea, which has developed alarming antibiotic resistance.

Dr. Bandekar's research interests include:

• Bacterial Cell Division Mechanisms
• Antibiotic Resistance Evolution
• Pathogen Adaptation to Antibiotic Pressure
• Neisseria gonorrhoeae Physiology
• Mycobacterium tuberculosis Cell Cycle
• Nucleotide Biosynthesis Pathways

His publication record reveals a consistent focus on bacterial cell division across different pathogens, bridging genomics and cellular biology approaches. Recent work examines how diplococcal bacteria like N. gonorrhoeae organize their division planes through axial asymmetry, while earlier research investigated transcriptional patterns in tuberculosis cell cycles.

Dr. Bandekar earned his PhD at University of Massachusetts Medical School under Christopher Sassetti, where he discovered novel connections between nucleotide biosynthesis and cell division regulation in mycobacteria.

His methodology integrates high-resolution microscopy, single-molecule tracking, genetic manipulation, and computational analysis to dissect the minimal protein machinery responsible for bacterial self-organization. This research has significant implications for identifying new antibiotic targets against increasingly resistant pathogens.