Kartik Shankar

Areas of Expertise

• Human development: biological mechanisms of developmental programming
• Maternal and early-life diet effects
• Nutrition & environmental factors in obesity development (and obesity metabolic co-morbidities)
• Pregnancy, intrauterine and early-life physiology
• Placental biology
• Animal models
• Clinical studies
• Cell & molecular techniques
• High dimensional “-omics”

Professional Summary

As a research scientist with the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service, Dr. Shankar serves as the Research Leader for the Responsive Agricultural Food Systems Research (RAFSR) unit. The mission of the Responsive Agricultural Food Systems Research Unit (RAFSRU) is to prevent and mitigate nutrition-associated chronic disease via innovations in the food-nutrition environment. The RAFSR is co-located with the IHA on the Texas A&M campus and works closely with its mission and members. Dr. Shankar serves as PI on three CRIS projects and as co-investigator on 3 NIH R01 grants.

Learn more about Research Projects at RAFSRU.

Prior to his position with the USDA, Dr. Shankar has served in various academic roles from 2005 to 2024, initially as Assistant Professor progressing to tenured full Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (2019) and as

Professor in the Section of Nutrition, Department of Pediatrics at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus (2019 – 2024). In his research roles, Dr. Shankar has served as the Associate Director of Basic Research at the USDA – Arkansas Children’s Nutrition Center (2015-2019), the Associate Director for the Molecular, Cellular & Analytical Core of the Colorado NORC and co-leader of the basic research track for the LEAD Center focused on epidemiology of obesity and diabetes (2019 – 2024).

Current studies are focused on understanding the impact of diet, nutrition and environmental stressors (eg. heat stress, PFAS, etc.) contributing to intergenerational transmission of chronic disease risk in a translational fashion. These studies leverage animal models in conjunction with longitudinal prospective clinical studies in mothers and infants. His group has developed methods to bridge existing clinical cohorts with nutritional biomarkers and environmental data and develop animal models to mimic exposures of malnutrition and heat stress.

Dr. Shankar’s research has resulted in the publication of >175 peer-reviewed scientific articles, 6 book chapters, other invited publications and over 60 invited presentations at national and international venues.

Publications

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