Kasturika Shankar is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Buffalo. She studies the molecular machinery inside cells, specifically how viruses exploit these systems to drive cancer growth. In this Postdoc Portrait interview, she shares her journey from being fascinated by biochemistry to uncovering how human papillomavirus (HPV) rewires the cell’s protein-making factory.
Cracking the Molecular Mystery of HPV
Q | What drew you to studying HPV?
I've always been drawn to questions about molecular machinery such as the tiny proteins and complexes inside cells that carry out life's most fundamental tasks. What pulled me specifically toward this area was realizing that viruses are extraordinarily good at exploiting that machinery in ways we haven't fully mapped yet. HPV-positive throat cancers are a particularly intriguing case: they tend to respond better to treatment than patients with similar cancers not caused by HPV, but we don't really know why. That mystery felt like an invitation. If the virus is changing how these cells behave at a deep molecular level, understanding that could explain the clinical differences we see in patients and potentially lead to better, more targeted treatments. The chance to do biochemistry that connects directly to patient outcomes was something I couldn't pass up.
Q | What scientific problem are you trying to solve?
Certain cancers are caused by viruses, and one of them is a type of throat cancer linked to HPV, the same virus behind most cervical cancers. While we know HPV causes these tumors, we don't fully understand how the virus takes control of the cell to drive cancer growth. My research focuses on an underexplored part of that question: not just which genes are switched on or off in these cancer cells, but how the virus manipulates the cell's protein-making machinery. Cells have a complex system for deciding which proteins to make, how much, and when, and I'm finding that HPV actively hijacks this system to its own advantage. By understanding exactly how the virus rewires protein production, we can start to identify what makes HPV-driven cancers tick differently from other cancers and potentially find new ways to target them.
Deconstructing Viral Misconceptions
Q | What’s one thing you learned from working in HPV research that you didn’t expect?
I expected to find some differences in how HPV-positive cancer cells make proteins compared to normal cells, but I didn't expect those differences to be so specific and patterned. When I analyzed which genes were being dialed down in these cancer cells, I found that they shared very particular structural features in their genetic sequences almost like a molecular signature that makes them especially vulnerable to the changes that HPV triggers. It suggests the virus isn't just causing general chaos in the cell; it’s selectively silencing certain genes in a surprisingly targeted way. That level of specificity was eye-opening, and it makes me more optimistic that there could be precise therapeutic strategies because if the effect is targeted, the intervention might be too.
Q | If your research succeeds, what could it change for science or society?
If we can pin down exactly how HPV manipulates a cancer cell's protein-making machinery, it could open up an entirely new category of drug targets—ones that are specific to virus-driven tumors and potentially spare healthy tissue. It could also serve as a blueprint for understanding other virus-caused cancers beyond throat cancer, since several other viruses are known to cause tumors in similar ways.
Q | What question are you most excited to answer next?
I want to know whether the specific vulnerability I'm uncovering in these cancer cells can be exploited with existing or new drugs. In addition, I want to figure out whether the molecular patterns I'm finding could one day help predict which patients are most likely to benefit from a particular treatment. Translating a mechanistic finding into something clinically useful is the part I'm most eager to chase.
Responses have been edited for length and clarity.
Are you a researcher who would like to be featured in the “Postdoc Portraits” series? Send in your application here.
