• Associate Professor, Chemical Engineering
  • William and Ruth Neely Faculty Fellow
  • Affiliated Faculty, Biomedical Engineering

Educational Background

  • Postdoctoral Research, Harvard University – 2015
  • Ph.D., Chemical Engineering, University of Delaware – 2010
  • B.E., Chemical Engineering, Mumbai University Institute of Chemical Technology, India – 2005

Research Interests

    • Cell Mechanics and Antibacterial Testing
    • Prevention of Cancer by Microbes
    • Nanobiotechnology and Protein Engineering
    • Biological and Soft-Matter Physics

Awards & Honors

  • 2023 Engineering Grant Genesis Award, Texas A&M University
  • 2018 Cells Young Investigator Award
  • 2018 Engineering Grant Genesis Award, Texas A&M University
  • 2017 High Risk High Impact Research Award, Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas
  • 2014 Best poster award, 20th Annual Boston Bacterial Meeting, Cambridge, MA
  • 2013 Semifinalist, Burroughs Wellcome Fund Careers at the Scientific Interface
  • 2011 Robert Macnab award for Outstanding presentation by a young investigator, Bacterial locomotion and Signal transduction Conference, New Orleans, LA
  • 2008 Best poster award, 11th Tiger-Hen-Hawk (Princeton-Delaware-Lehigh) Rheology Symposium, Newark, DE

Selected Publications

  • J. Antani, R. Gupta, A. H. Lee, M. D. Manson, and P. P. Lele, “Mechanosensitive recruitment of stator units promotes binding of the response regulator CheY-P to the flagellar motor”, Nature Communications, 2021
  • J. Antani, A. X Sumali, T. P. Lele, P.P. Lele, “Asymmetric random walks reveal that the chemotaxis network modulates flagellar rotational bias in Helicobacter pylori”, eLife, 2021
  • J. Yang, R. Chawla, K. Rhee, R. Gupta, M. Manson, A. Jayaraman, P. P. Lele, “Biphasic chemotaxis of Escherichia coli to the microbiota metabolite indole”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA, 2020
  • P.P. Lele, T. Roland, A. Shrivastava, Y. Chen, H. C. Berg, “The flagellar motor of Caulobacter crescentus generates more torque when a cell swims backward.”, Nature Physics, 2016
  • P. P. Lele, Basarab G. Hosu, H. C. Berg, “Dynamics of mechanosensing in the bacterial flagellar motor”, Proceedings of the National of Academy of Sciences, USA, 2013