Area of Research

• Scrub typhus & other Rickettsial diseases
• Atypical Bacterial infections (Mycoplasma pneumoniae
• Chlamydophila pneumoniae, Legionella pneumophila)
• Lyme’s diseases
• Bartonellosis
• Leptospirosis

Areas of research interest

• Antimicrobial resistance
• Hospital Infection Control (HIC) and Hospital acquired infections (HAI)
• Antimicrobial stewardship
• Peritonitis
• Bacterial serology

Dr. Kiran Bala has completed her M.B.B.S. from Lady Hardinge Medical College, New Delhi in 2007. She has completed her M.D. Microbiology in 2012 from Government Medical College & Hospital, Chandigarh. She has worked as a Senior Resident in Department of Microbiology at Maulana Azad Medical College (M.A.M.C.) and Lok Nayak Hospital, Delhi. She has joined the institute in December 2016.

She looks after the routine functioning of Mycobacteriology laboratory;HIC Core Committee Member, AIIMS, New Delhi; Hospital Infection Control Officer, National Centre of Ageing & Department of Pulmonary Medicine & Sleep disorders.

Areas of research interest:

• Clinical Microbiology with major interest in Tuberculosis and opportunistic infections.
• Diagnostics of Tuberculosis
• Multi drug resistant Tuberculosis (MDR)
• Non-tubercular Mycobacteria (NTM)
• Therapeutic advances of tuberculosis
• Hospital Infection Control

Publications in indexed journals: 35

After completing her MBBS and MD from University College of Medical Sciences, Delhi University, she did her senior residency in Microbiology from AIIMS, Delhi. She later worked in research project on Influenza virus in virology section and joined as a faculty member in the Virology Section of Department of Microbiology since Nov 2016.

Her areas of interest include post-transplant infections (BK virus, CMV), arboviral diseases (Dengue, Chikungunya), respiratory viruses, cell culture and molecular virology.

Dr Urvashi B Singh’s research interests include adult and pediatric tuberculosis, Drug resistant TB, TB treatment and novel regimens, TB epidemiology, TB diagnostics, novel biomarkers, HIV-associated TB, Non-tubercular mycobacteria and Mycobacterium avium-paratuberculosis. The research work includes multiple domains in Mycobacterium tuberculosis including understanding the epidemiology and pathogenesis of tuberculosis, molecular insights into spread of multidrug resistant tuberculosis, designing of novel rapid detection method for multidrug resistant tuberculosis, rifampicin resistance, molecular typing and whole genome sequencing. Her research has expanded knowledge of drug resistance mutations and molecular epidemiology of TB in India. Her pioneering work for detecting viable TB bacteria in treatment failure patients and subsequent work on therapeutic drug monitoring in this group of patients have direct policy relevance. She has ongoing research for newer drug regimens for Rifampicin sensitive and resistant TB. Her collaborative work on therapeutic use of the Indian vaccine against TB (MIP) paved the way for a Prevention of Disease vaccine trial. Her research on Biomarkers has yielded new molecules, which hold promise. Her work in the field of MDR contact tracing has yielded novel data and some novel hypothesis for relapse and reinfection TB and disease transmission. Her research has led to several patents, which are in different stages of translation to companies. One novel cost effective diagnostic tests for rapid detection of MDR and XDR TB has been validated by ICMR and will be taken up by a manufacturer shortly.

Tuberculosis laboratory is NABL accredited, fully equipped to offer complete diagnostic services for diagnosis of tuberculosis (TB), Non-tubercular Mycobacteria (NTM), and drug resistance to various anti-tubercular drugs by molecular as well as conventional methods. The laboratory offers microscopy, culture (both liquid and solid), PCR, Truenat, and Gene-Xpert for diagnosis of TB and NTM. In addition, the conventional drug sensitivity testing in liquid and solid culture media, Gene-Xpert, Truenat, Line Probe Assay are available for detecting resistance to both first line and second line drugs. The laboratory is equipped with state of art molecular typing techniques for TB. All the techniques are quality assured. The laboratory carries out research under several funded schemes (Extramural funding support for Whole Genome Sequencing, Early Bactericidal Activity, Therapeutic Drug Monitoring, Point of Care tests (Aptamer based), Novel biomarkers, Rapid molecular drug resistance detection, Molecular Epidemiology of MDR-TB).

She is a Member, National TB Expert Group, National TB Elimination Program, GoI; Member, Subject Expert Committees, CDSCO (DCGI), GoI; Member, Diagnostic Committee, India TB Research Consortium, ICMR; Member, Operational Research Committee, National TB Elimination Program, GoI; Member, Project Review Committees of DBT, ICMR, TDB, GoI; Member, ICMR Task Force on Genital Tuberculosis; Member Editorial Board, Associate Editor, Frontiers in Medicine, Frontiers in Public Health and Frontiers in Microbiology; Scientific Collaborations with Several International and National Institutes; Reviewer for International and National Journals; More than 150 peer-reviewed Publications; Over 50 funded Research studies; Five patents Publications:~150; Citations: 4386; H index: 32; I10 index: 67