Dr. Khatri received his Ph.D. in Pharmacology and Toxicology under Dr. Marvin Schulte from Philadelphia College of Pharmacy. Dr. Khatri’s doctoral dissertation examined pharmacology of novel antidepressive drug class, their structure-function activity at the binding site of 5HT3A receptors. In addition, he studied nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) as potential targets for OCD drug candidates using behavioral assays in mouse models of OCD which resulted in a US patent. In his current work he has demonstrated, for the first time, the presence of δ-subunit containing GABAARs in cerebellar Purkinje cells. These signaling pathways overlap with a mechanism by which sleep aids, some antiepileptic drugs, and anesthetics seem to work.
In Dr. Khatri’s second Postdoctoral position in Dr. Gipson-Reichardt’s lab, he will study synaptic/extrasynaptic changes acquired by neurons in Nucleus accumbens (NAc) by nicotine addiction. Dr. Khatri wishes to examine the epigenetic change induced by nicotine that increases the susceptibility of relapse and reward by ‘Patch-Seq’, a combination of whole cell patch clamp with single cell qPCR and RNA-seq. He is also interested in studying cerebellar projections in the NAc and their contribution in nicotine addiction.