Brief introduction to the facilities:

St. John’s Research Institute (SJRI) is an integral part of the St. John’s Academy of Health Sciences that is administered by the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI) and was started in year 2004. Vision of the institute is to improve health of the community through research and development of a center for excellence in Medical Research. Division of Molecular medicine within SJRI comprises of the Cell biology, Molecular Biology Research group, Genetics, Clinical Proteomics and Oncology.

We have established a state-of-the-art molecular diagnostics lab with a full range of molecular platforms including Next-Gen-Sequencing, Real time PCR, Molecular pathology, Tissue culture and flow cytometry. The institute also has a world class biorepository with liquid N2 storage facility for clinical samples that is monitored round the clock. SJRI has a fully equipped Animal house with permits to work on small animals and registered under CPCSEA.In addition to the patient specimen centric work we have established experimental mammalian cell culture facilities and individually-ventilated –caging-systems to establish patient derived Xenografts (PDX). Using these approaches we have explored mechanisms of chemo resistance and metastasis mediated via tumor stroma interaction.

In the proteomics division, the major biophysical techniques used include absorption and emission spectroscopy and mass spectrometry. Clinically important biomarkers can be screened in the biological fluid, using mass spectrometry based proteomics. Cell culture group is interested in probing the basic biology of various biomolecules using the tissue culture facility and invitro models from the wide array of cell lines available at our Cell line Biorepository

Oncology research group is interested in establishing the long-term outcomes in women treated for breast cancer and the molecular correlates of these outcomes.We have been the recipient of two 10-year philanthropic grants in addition to other extramural grants that have enabled such long-term un-interrupted activity. We currently also have National and International grants supporting our work including the most prestigious Welcome-DBT intermediate fellowship.

We have a unique advantage of a full time pathologist, molecular biologists, bioinformaticians and bio statisticians working in the Research facility .With our current scientific and technical expertise, we are primed to undertake industry liaised collaborations for various projects such as drug screening, testing of compounds of therapeutic value on a range of in-vivo and in-vitro model systems and big data analysis.