Center for Geroscience and Healthy Brain Aging > Our People > Labs

Unnikrishnan Lab

Archana Unnikrishnan, PhD
Assistant Professor

Lab focus

The overarching objective of Dr. Unnikrishnan's lab is to study the effects of early-life interventions on aging and the lab uses two early-life intervention models for this research:

Effect of early-life (pre-and post-weaning) Dietary Restriction on healthspan (e.g., gastrointestinal health, insulin sensitivity, cognition etc) and lifespan of mouse models. We study stem cell aging and epigenetics as potential mechanisms underlying DR's antiaging effects.
Effect of diet-induced maternal obesity on healthspan and aging of offsprings. We study cellular senescence and cellular senescence related inflammation as potential mechanisms driving the accelerated aging phenotype in the offspring born to obese mothers.

Why it matters

Barker's hypothesis proposes that late-life diseases could have fetal/early-life origins. Adverse nutrition in early life, including in-utero environment increases the susceptibility of the offspring to obesity, diabetes, hypertension, coronary heart disease and poor cognition. For example, data from humans show that offspring born to obese mothers are susceptible to short-term and long-term adverse effects which can manifest into adulthood (~25-30 years of age) of the offspring. These data indicate that poor early-life nutrition/environment can lead to an accelerated aging phenotype in the offspring. Because the long-term effects of early-life nutrition/environment are likely to have serious public health implications as the children grow older and age, there is an urgent need for research into the pathways altered by early-life nutrition/environment to develop interventions to treat the offspring exposed to early-life adverse conditions.

Faculty Bio

Archana Unnikrishnan, PhD

Geroscience College of Medicine
Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Assistant Professor
Director of Research Programs

Academic history:
BS Biochemistry
MS Biochemistry
PhD Nutrition and Food Science

Publications

Unnikrishnan, A., Jackson, J., Matyi SA., Hadad, N., Wronowski, B., Georgescu, C., Garrett, KP., Wren, JD., Freeman WM., Richardson, A. (2017) Role of DNA methylation on Dietary Restriction mediated memory effect. GeroScience: 39:331-345. PubMed PMCID: PMC5505897.

Matyi, S., Jackson, J., Garrett, K., Deepa, SS., and Unnikrishnan, A. (2018). The effect of different levels of dietary restriction on glucose homeostasis. Geroscience: PubMed PMCID: PMC5964050.

Kurup, K., Matyi, S., Giles CB., Wren, JD., Jones, K., Ericsson, A., Raftery, D., Wang, L., Promislow, D., Richardson, A., and Unnikrishnan, A. (2021). Calorie Restriction Prevents Age-Related Changes in the Intestinal Microbiota. Aging 13(5):6298-6329. doi: 10.18632/aging.202753. PMCID: PMC7993711.

Kurup, K., Mann, SN., Jackson, J., Matyi, S., Ranjo-Bishop, M., Freeman, WM., Stout, MB., Richardson, A., and Unnikrishnan, A. (2021). Litter expansion alters metabolic homeostasis in a sexually divergent manner. PLoS One 16(9):e0237199; doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0237199. PMID: 34587168.

Unnikrishnan, A., et al. (2021). A Reevaluation of the Effect of Dietary Restriction on Different Recombinant Inbred (RI) Lines of Male and Female Mice. Aging Cell. 11: e13500. Pubmed PMCID: PMC8590105.

Current Funding

OCASCR, Characterization of the molecular heterogeneity of the intestinal stem cells

HHDC-PHF, “The Long-Term Effects of Maternal Obesity on Aging and Healthspan.”

OCASCR, “Short-term dietary restriction rescues the age-related decline in intestinal stem cell regenerative capacity”.

P20GM125528, “Effect of dietary restriction on intestinal stem cell aging”.

Completed Research Support:

1K01AG056655-01A1, “Role of DNA methylation in Dietary Restriction mediated insulin sensitivity”.

Contact Information

Phone: (405) 271-8000 Ext 35504

Email: archana-unnikrishnan@ouhsc.edu

Mailing address:
975 NE 10th Street (BRC354)
Oklahoma City, OK 73104

Office location: BRC 354

Lab location: BRC 356