Biography
Dr. Abhilesh Dhawanjewar is an Evolutionary Geneticist and Bioinformatician who investigates the fundamental co-dependence of the mitochondrial and nuclear genomes. His research explores how this intricate interplay, essential for aerobic life, has evolved, and how its disruption, through factors like mitochondrial heteroplasmy and dysfunction, can lead to human diseases.
He completed an integrated BS-MS in Bioinformatics at IISER Pune, where he developed a tool for predicting protein-protein interactions. He then completed his PhD in Evolutionary Biology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where he studied mitochondrial-nuclear coevolution at different biological scales, exploring genetic incompatibilities and compensatory evolution using Drosophila and mammalian datasets
Following this, he held a postdoctoral position at University College London, where he combined empirical and computational approaches to investigate sexually antagonistic variation in *Drosophila* through experimental evolution and Approximate Bayesian Computation. In 2024, Abhilesh joined the MRC Mitochondrial Biology Unit and the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge, working with Dr. Jelle van den Ameele and Prof. Patrick Chinnery, where his current research focuses on multimodal single-cell genomics to investigate the fundamental processes underlying mitochondrial gene expression, regulation, and cell-type specificity.
Beyond his research, Abhilesh has been an active member of the academic community. He served as Vice President of the Graduate Students Association and helped organise several science communication conferences during his time at UNL. As a postdoctoral researcher, he also served as the postdoctoral representative for the Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment at UCL. Outside of academia, he takes an active part in conservation and rewilding efforts and is part of the Ealing Beaver Project, an urban beaver reintroduction initiative in Greater London.
Research Interests
Dr. Abhilesh Dhawanjewar's research is guided by a set of fundamental questions: How did the mitochondrial and nuclear genomes evolve such a tightly integrated relationship? What happens at the molecular level when this relationship breaks down? And why do mitochondrial diseases manifest so differently across cell types?
These questions build on his prior work investigating genetic incompatibilities, compensatory evolution, and sexually antagonistic variation across evolutionary timescales and experimental systems. His research has spanned model organisms and comparative genomics, combining computational approaches with experimental evolution to test how evolutionary pressures shape genome interactions and conflict resolution across different biological contexts.
At the MRC MBU, his current work focuses on the next layer of complexity: How is mitochondrial gene expression regulated in different cell types? What cellular features determine vulnerability to mitochondrial dysfunction? By applying multimodal single-cell genomics, he aims to understand the fundamental processes that sustain mitochondrial function, and the factors that lead to their breakdown.
Selected Publications
Camus, M. F., & Dhawanjewar, A. S. (2023)
Multilevel selection on mitochondrial genomes
Current Opinion in Genetics & Development 80 102050
Dhawanjewar, A. S., Roy, A. A., & Madhusudhan, M. S. (2020)
A knowledge-based scoring function to assess quaternary associations of proteins
Bioinformatics 36(12) 3739-3748
Montooth, K. L., Dhawanjewar, A. S., & Meiklejohn, C. D. (2019)
Temperature-sensitive reproduction and the physiological and evolutionary potential for Mother’s Curse
Integrative and Comparative Biology 59(4) 890-899