Dr Suchita Nadkarni

Profile

Suchita obtained her BSc in Biomedical Science at King’s College London. She then went on to obtain her PhD at University College London, under the supervision of Profs Michael Ehrenstein and Claudia Mauri, where she investigated the role of regulatory T-cells in anti-TNF-treated rheumatoid arthritis patients. Following a brief post-doc in New York, Suchita left lab-based research for a year to work as a Senior Science Adviser to the Government. In 2009, she then returned to lab research, undertaking post-doc project with Prof Mauro Perretti at the WHRI looking into the role of neutrophils in patients with Giant Cell Arteritis. It was during this time that Suchita developed her interests in neutrophils, combining it with her background in T-cell immunology. In 2013 Suchita joined Prof Federica Marelli-Berg’s group, where she developed her niche investigating the importance of neutrophil-T cell interactions during pregnancy. In 2017 Suchita was awarded a 5-year intermediate research fellowship from the British Heart Foundation.

Research

Group members

Dr Eleanor Ward (Postdoctoral Researcher); Dr Alice Christensen (Clinical Fellow); Ms Serena Bert (PhD student)

Summary 

Suchita’s work focuses on the role of the maternal immune system in shaping pregnancy outcomes. Suchita is specifically interested in how maternal neutrophils can influence T-cell responses and how such interactions can regulate placental development (see image) and her main disease area of interest is pre-eclampsia In addition to their roles in placental development, Suchita is also interested in how neutrophil-T cell interactions can influence maternal cardiovascular responses during pregnancy and fetal development.

The Placenta Rainbow  - Wellcome Image Award 2017 and National Geographic 2018

Using wide-field confocal scanning microscopy, The Placenta Rainbow, depicts 9 different mouse placentas that have been individually imaged and arranged in PhotoShop.  Each placenta derives from a distinct mouse pregnancy in which the mother’s immune system has been manipulated to assess the architecture of the placentas. Following extraction, the placentas are labelled with different coloured antibodies that bind to specific proteins.  The varying colours denotes specific structures within the placenta and allows us to assess whether manipulation of the mother’s immune system affects development of the placenta.  Such assessments could help identify targets for complications arising in human pregnancies.

Key Publications

ORCID iD: 0000-0002-4549-3983

• Ward EJ, Bert S, Fanti S, Malone KM, Maughan RT, Gkantsinikoudi C, Prin F, Volpato LK, Piovezan AP, Graham GJ, Dufton NP, Perretti M, Marelli-Berg FM and Nadkarni S. Placental Inflammation Leads to Abnormal Embryonic Heart Development. Circulation. 2022.
• Bert S, Nadkarni S and Perretti M. Neutrophil-T cell crosstalk and the control of the host inflammatory response. Immunol Rev. 2022.
• Bert S, Ward EJ and Nadkarni S. Neutrophils in pregnancy: New insights into innate and adaptive immune regulation. Immunology. 2021.
• Nadkarni, S. et al. Identification of an activated neutrophil phenotype in polymyalgia rheumatica during steroid treatment: a potential involvement of immune cell cross-talk. Clinical science 133, 839-851, doi:10.1042/CS20180415 (2019).
• Lashin, H. M. S. et al. Microvesicle Subsets in Sepsis Due to Community Acquired Pneumonia Compared to Faecal Peritonitis. Shock, doi:10.1097/SHK.0000000000000989 (2017).
• Hebeda, C. B. et al. Endogenous annexin A1 (AnxA1) modulates early phase gestation and offspring sex-ratio skewing. Journal of cellular physiology, doi:10.1002/jcp.26258 (2017).
• Nadkarni, S. et al. Neutrophils induce proangiogenic T cells with a regulatory phenotype in pregnancy. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 113, E8415-E8424, doi:10.1073/pnas.1611944114 (2016).
• Komarowska, I. et al. Hepatocyte Growth Factor Receptor c-Met Instructs T Cell Cardiotropism and Promotes T Cell Migration to the Heart via Autocrine Chemokine Release. Immunity 42, 1087-1099, doi:10.1016/j.immuni.2015.05.014 (2015).
• Haas, R. et al. Lactate Regulates Metabolic and Pro-inflammatory Circuits in Control of T Cell Migration and Effector Functions. PLOS Biol 13, e1002202, doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1002202 (2015).
• Old, E. A. et al. Monocytes expressing CX3CR1 orchestrate the development of vincristine-induced pain. The Journal of clinical investigation 124, 2023-2036, doi:10.1172/JCI71389 (2014).
• Nadkarni, S. et al. Investigational analysis reveals a potential role for neutrophils in giant-cell arteritis disease progression. Circulation research 114, 242-248, doi:10.1161/CIRCRESAHA.114.301374 (2014).
• Nadkarni, S. & McArthur, S. Oestrogen and immunomodulation: new mechanisms that impact on peripheral and central immunity. Current opinion in pharmacology 13, 576-581, doi:10.1016/j.coph.2013.05.007 (2013).
• Spurr, L. et al. Comparative analysis of Annexin A1-formyl peptide receptor 2/ALX expression in human leukocyte subsets. International immunopharmacology 11, 55-66, doi:10.1016/j.intimp.2010.10.006 (2011).
• Nadkarni, S., Cooper, D., Brancaleone, V., Bena, S. & Perretti, M. Activation of the annexin A1 pathway underlies the protective effects exerted by estrogen in polymorphonuclear leukocytes. Arteriosclerosis, thrombosis, and vascular biology 31, 2749-2759, doi:10.1161/ATVBAHA.111.235176 (2011).
• Nadkarni, S., Mauri, C. & Ehrenstein, M. R. Anti-TNF-alpha therapy induces a distinct regulatory T cell population in patients with rheumatoid arthritis via TGF-beta. The Journal of experimental medicine 204, 33-39, doi:10.1084/jem.20061531 (2007). 

Collaborators

Internal

• Prof Federica Marelli-Berg (WHRI)

Clinical collaborators

• Dr Elena Greco
• Dr Stamatina Iliodromiti
• Prof Steve Thornton
• Dr Anna Herrey
• Dr Neha Sekhri

News

March 2017
Wellcome image awards 2017 (Wellcome)

March 2017
The Wellcome image awards 2017: the shortlist of the years best science visions (The Observer)

March 2018
The Placenta May Hold Clues to a Deadly Pregnancy Illness (National Geographic)