Dr. NithyaBaburajendran is currently the acting head of the protein crystallography department in Experimental Drug Development Centre, Singapore. Her main research interests are in small molecule, fragment and peptide interactions with protein and using this information in drug discovery. She completed her PhD in Structural Biochemistry at the National University of Singapore and Genome Institute of Singapore. Her work involved studying DNA recognition specificity of transcription factors in stem cells. She further went on to do a post-doctorate in Columbia University to study the protein-DNA specificity of the Hox family of transcription factors during animal development.