Dr. Prasad received his PhD from Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India and his postdoctoral training at University of Minnesota, Medical School and the Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, California, where he subsequently became assistant professor. In 2001, he joined the high throughput structure-based drug discovery startup, Syrrx as associate director and led the crystallography efforts for the discovery of Alogliptin, a DPP4 inhibitor for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. In 2006, he joined Merck and Co. Inc., where he was lead crystallographer and core member of multiple drug discovery programs, including schizophrenia and HIV-1 AIDS. He has been instrumental in building and implementing fragment-based technologies in multiple organizations including Merck and Metabasis. He is co-inventor of six US/International patents and has published 45 research articles and text book chapters. He serves on the editorial board of Current Protein and Peptide Science.