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Aparna Venugopal

DC1
Linkedin

I am excited by the BioTransform project because it brings together microbiome science, analytical chemistry, and natural products research to better understand how food bioactives are transformed in the human body.

DC1: Tracking differences in gastrointestinal metabolism of bilberry bioactives between healthy/normal weight and prediabetic individuals through the in vitro gastrointestinal simulation model GIDM-colon

Supervisor: Prof. Emmy Tuenter

Co-Supervisors: Prof. Rudolf Bauer (UGraz), Dr. Dimitrios Michailidis (PharmaGnose)

Secondments This project is carried out in strong collaboration with the institutions listed below:

  • Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Pharmacognosy, University of Graz, Austria

  • Food Biosciences Department, Agriculture and Food Development Authority (Teagasc), Cork, Ireland

  • PharmaGnose Biotechnologies, Athens, Greece

Project description

This project investigates the gastrointestinal biotransformation of bilberry-derived polyphenols using an in vitro simulation model (GIDM-colon). By integrating UPLC-HRMS/MS-based metabolite profiling with microbiome-derived faecal samples from healthy and prediabetic/obese individuals across different European populations, the study aims to characterise how gut microbiota influences the metabolic fate of dietary bioactives. The project will generate comparative metabolomic profiles to understand population- and disease-specific differences in bioactive metabolism.

 

To better understand the influence of gut microbiota and metabolic health on these biotransformations, the study will compare five experimental conditions: pooled faecal cultures from healthy South-European individuals, healthy Central-European individuals, prediabetic/obese South-European individuals, prediabetic/obese Central-European individuals, and a control consisting only of the bilberry supplement without faecal cultures.

The Bilberry bioactive metabolites in dialysates generated during the GIDM colon experiments will then be analysed and profiled using advanced UPLC-HRMS/MS techniques.

 

Through this work, the project is expected to identify and annotate a broad range of metabolites produced from in vitro biotransformation experiments of the bilberry supplement. It also aims to reveal differences in metabolite profiles between healthy and prediabetic/obese individuals, as well as between Central- and South-European populations.

 

What interests me most about this project is the opportunity to study microbiome-driven biotransformation of bilberry bioactives in a highly controlled experimental setup. I am particularly interested in understanding how gut microbiota composition influences the biotransformation of dietary polyphenols, specifically bilberry bioactives, and how this varies between individuals with different metabolic health states. I am especially drawn to the integration of the GIDM-colon model with high-resolution analytical techniques such as UPLC-HRMS/MS to characterise complex and previously unannotated metabolite profiles generated during gastrointestinal digestion.

Professional background

My name is Aparna Venugopal, and I am originally from Kerala, India. I am currently a doctoral candidate in the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions BioTransform Doctoral Network under the supervision of Professor Dr. Emmy Tuenter at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. My PhD research focuses on the gastrointestinal biotransformation of bilberry bioactives using in vitro gut simulation model (GIDM-colon) combined with UPLC-HRMS/MS-based metabolite profiling to investigate microbiome-associated differences in metabolism between healthy and prediabetic individuals.

 

I completed my master’s degree in Drug Discovery and Development at Uppsala University, where I developed a strong interest in natural products research, analytical chemistry, and metabolomics. Prior to this, I obtained my bachelor’s degree in Pharmacy, which provided foundation in pharmacology, pharmacognosy and analytical chemistry, along with an early understanding of drug delivery systems and molecular therapeutics.

 

During my master’s thesis at Uppsala University, I developed and optimised a high-throughput elicitor screening platform aimed at activating silent biosynthetic gene clusters in Streptomyces species. This interdisciplinary project combined microbiology assays, high-throughput screening approaches, and LC-MS/UHPLC-based metabolomics to investigate elicitor-induced changes in secondary metabolism and discovery novel antimicrobial molecules. To further strengthen my analytical expertise, I worked as a research intern in the Analytical Chemistry for Life Sciences group at Uppsala University. In this role, I contributed to method development and validation for the separation and quantification of steroids and amino acids relevant to neurological disorders, using UPLC-MS/MS and UPSFC-MS/MS platforms.