Academic Interests
Chaudhry is currently focused on the functional mechanisms involved in the replenishment of neurotransmitters glutamate and GABA in the central nervous system.
In particular, his group's research investigates the molecular mechanisms of the transport proteins involved in the glutamate/GABA-glutamine cycle, and their physiological and pathophysiological roles in a variety of disease conditions.
Higher education and employment history
Research:
- 2000 - 2005: Career scholarship holder, Research Council of Norway, "Amino acid transport systems and synaptic transmission", Department of Anatomy, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, University of Oslo.
Education:
- 2002: Dr. med. (MD, PhD), Project "Amino acid transporters at the synapse", research conducted in the Department of Anatomy, University of Oslo, as well as at the Departments of Neurology and Physiology, University of California San Francisco (UCSF).
- 1996: Medical Doctor, University of Oslo.
Honoraria
- 2007: Outstanding Young Investigator Award, Research Council of Norway.
- 2006: Anders Jahre’s award for medical research (“The award is a recognition of outstanding scientific achievement or research results in the Nordic countries”).
- 2005: “Young Investigator Lectureship Award”, The International Society for Neurochemistry (ISN). (“Recognizes research achievements of promising young scientists involved in neurochemical research”)
- 2003: His Majesty the King’s Gold Medal for the best PhD thesis at the Medical Faculty, University of Oslo.
- 2001 - 2006: Career-stipend, Research Council of Norway.
- 1997 - 1998: US-Norway Fulbright Foundation for Educational Exchange Award.
- 1997: The Unger-Vetlesen Medical Fund Award.
Academic and professional committees
- 2009 - present: Member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters.
- 2007 - present: Reviewing editor for “Tidsskriftet for Dnlf” (Journal for the association of Norwegian Physicians).
Communication of science
Chaudhry is committed to the dissemination of science and has published more than 35 original publications in peer reviewed journals such as Cell, Science, Neuron (2x), EMBO J, PNAS (2x), J Neurosci (8x), Cereb Cortex (2x), and J Am Soc Nephrol, as well as reviews and book chapters in such publications as Annu Rev Pharmacol Toxicol and Handb Exp Pharmacol. In addition, he publishes regularly in newspapes, gives public lectures and has been an invited speaker at international conferences more than 20 times.
Research activities and key achievements
- Opened the field of H+-coupled amino acid transporters by identifying SN1 (Cell 1999) and functionally characterizing several homologues (PNAS 2000, J Neurosci 2002).
- Demonstrated the existence of channel like activities within the transporter proteins (EMBO J 2001).
- Demonstrated involvement of the amino acid transporter SAT2 in glutamatergic retrograde signaling (Cereb Cortex 2008b) and association of the homologous SAT1 with GABAergic neurotransmission (Front Neuroanat 2010).
- Demonstrated involvement of SN1 in pH homeostasis during chronic metabolic acidosis (J Am Soc Nephrol 2005), its membrane trafficking (J Neurosci 2011) and potential involvement in insulin release from pancreas (Biochem Biophys Res Commun 2009).
- Identified the significance of a vesicular glutamate transporter, VGLUT3, and demonstrated potential for differential release of multiple transmitters from a single nerve terminal (PNAS 2003; J Comp Neurol 2004; Cereb Cortex 2008a).
- Contributed to the analysis of the first knock-out of a VGLUT, showing its importance for the maintenance of synaptic vesicles (Science 2004).
- High resolution quantitative electron microscopic localization of transporter proteins (Neuron 1995, J Biol Chem 1998; J Neurosci 1998, Neuron 2010).