Biography
Dr. Navonil Banerjee joined the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics as an Assistant Professor in September 2026. He received his Ph.D. in Neurobiology in the laboratory of Dr. Michael Francis at UMass Chan Medical School where he studied neuropeptide and GPCR signaling mechanisms driving behavior using the free-living nematode Caenorhabditis elegans as a model. His postdoctoral research in Dr. Elissa Hallem’s laboratory at UCLA focused on how chemosensation drives host-parasite interactions in helminths. Using the skin-penetrating human-infective nematode Strongyloides stercoralis as a model, his work demonstrated how parasitic helminths detect and respond to carbon dioxide, a host-derived chemical cue, and how responses to CO2 drive crucial steps of host-parasite interactions.
Dr. Banerjee’s postdoctoral work has been funded by a T32 training grant and an F32 NRSA. He is also the recipient of a New Innovator Award (DP2) from NIAID. Research in the Banerjee Lab integrates parasitology, neurobiology, and molecular genetics to uncover how host-derived chemical signals shape helminth parasitism at the cellular, molecular, and organismal levels.
Education
- Postdoctoral Training
- University of California Los Angeles
- PhD
- University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School
Areas of Interest
Research Interests
Parasitic helminths infect approximately 2 billion people worldwide causing extensive morbidity. Infections can be life-threatening in immunosuppressed individuals. Despite their enormous global impact, our knowledge of how these parasites interact with their hosts to establish infections, is extremely limited. With drug resistance on the rise, there is an urgent need to develop new strategies to combat infections.
These parasites encounter a complex landscape of host-derived chemicals throughout their life cycle. Do these chemicals act as sensory and/or metabolic signals that enable helminths to successfully parasitize humans? How do helminths sense, interpret and utilize these signals to survive and propagate? Combining knowledge of parasitology, neurobiology and molecular genetics, my interdisciplinary research program broadly aims to:
- investigate how host-derived chemical cues shape helminth development, behavior and physiology to promote infections.
- elucidate the cellular and molecular mechanisms by which these parasites detect, integrate and respond to these cues.
- uncover parasite-specific adaptations that enable helminths to interact with the host chemical environment.
We use Strongyloides stercoralis, a skin-penetrating human-parasitic nematode as a primary model organism. S. stercoralis is a medically-important parasite that infects approximately 610 million people globally. It is also one of the few genetically-tractable parasitic worm species which enables in vivo mechanistic studies of host-parasite interactions using transgenesis and targeted mutagenesis. We complement our studies of parasitic nematodes with parallel investigations in the free-living model nematode C. elegans. Comparing the responses of a free-living and a parasitic nematode species to the same chemical cue will enable us to identify unique parasite-specific adaptations and will provide insights into the evolution of parasitism in helminths
The overall goal of our research is to understand how the host chemical environment shapes helminth parasitism – a poorly understood area in the field of infectious disease. Our research will also inform the development of new anthelmintic drugs that disrupt critical interactions of helminths with host-derived chemicals.
Publications
Navonil Banerjee*, Breanna Walsh*, Ruhi Patel*, Michelle Castelletto and Elissa Hallem (2025). Protocol to generate stable knockout lines in the human-parasitic nematode Strongyloides stercoralis (external link). STAR Protocols, 2025 Nov 13;6(4):104201. (* co-first author)
Navonil Banerjee, Spencer S. Gang, Michelle L. Castelletto, Breanna Walsh, Felicitas Ruiz and Elissa A. Hallem (2025). Carbon dioxide shapes parasite-host interactions in a human-infective (external link) nematode (external link). Current Biology, Volume 35, Issue 2, 277-286.e6.
Navonil Banerjee, Elisa Rojas Palato, Pei-Yin Shih, Paul W. Sternberg and Elissa A. Hallem (2024). Distinct neurogenetic mechanisms establish the same chemosensory valence state at different life stages in Caenorhabditis elegans (external link). G3 (Bethesda), jkad271.
Navonil Banerjee, Pei-Yin Shih, Elisa Rojas Palato, Paul W. Sternberg and Elissa A. Hallem (2023). Differential processing of a chemosensory cue across life stages sharing the same valence state in Caenorhabditis elegans (external link). PNAS 120 (19) e2218023120.
Shankar Ramachandran*, Navonil Banerjee*, Raja Bhattacharya*, Michele Lemons, Jeremy Florman, Christopher Lambert, Denis Touroutine, Kelliane Alexander, Liliane Schoofs, Mark Alkema, Isabel Beets and Michael Francis (2021). A conserved neuropeptide system links head and body motor circuits to enable adaptive behavior (external link). eLife 10:e71747 (* co-first author).
Navonil Banerjee and Elissa A. Hallem (2019). The role of carbon dioxide in nematode behavior and physiology (external link). Parasitology Oct 11:1-55.
Navonil Banerjee, Raja Bhattacharya, Michael Gorczyca, Kevin M Collins and Michael Francis (2017). Local neuropeptide signaling modulates serotonergic transmission to shape the temporal organization of C. elegans egg-laying behavior (external link). PLOS Genetics 13(4):e1006697.