Author contributions

Punnya V Angadi and Anoushka Chauhan conceptualized and designed as well as conducted the study.

Bhushan B Kulkarni and Mehreen S Belawadi performed the laboratory procedures and methodology validation.

Rashmi Patil assisted with patient recruitment and sample collection.

Karthiga Sakthi assisted with statistics.

Anoushka Chauhan and Punnya Angadi drafted the manuscript.

All authors reviewed and approved the final manuscript.