Faheem Ahmad is a Senior Assistant Professor of Plant Pathology & Nematology at the Department of Botany of Aligarh Muslim University in India. AHMAD studied plant nematology at Aligarh Muslim University, where he obtained his doctoral degree in 2009. He was also worked as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Ehime University, Japan. Before that, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow at North-West University-Mafikeng Campus (South Africa) and National Sun Yat-Sen University, Kaohsiung (Taiwan). At present, AHMAD is involved with both teaching and research. He is also an Associate Editor of the Journal of Plant Diseases and Protection (Scientific Journal of the "Deutsche Phytomedizinische Gesellschaft" (DPG) - the German Society of Plant Protection and Plant Health), Springer. AHMAD and his team's research focus on nematode management and plant-nematode/microbe interaction. AHMAD has published over 43 peer-reviewed research papers. After joining Aligarh Muslim University as faculty in 2017, he was awarded a UGC Start-up Grant for a 2-year research project in 2018. Rakesh Pandey is Professor Emeritus AcSIR & CSIR-Emeritus Scientist, Crop Protection and Production Division, CSIR-Central Institute of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants, Lucknow. His research contributions have got wide recognition both at national and international levels in the field of crop protection. He has authored over 163 research papers, 35 book chapters, 18 review articles, 04-US patents granted, several books, bulletins, popular articles, developed and has developed 08 disease resistant plant varieties of medicinal and aromatic plants. He has got 29 rhizospheric microbes accession number from NCBI. He is Fellow of National Academy of Agricultural Sciences (NAAS) New Delhi. He is recipient of several National and International awards among which few are as DAAD Fellow (1990-1993) and Senior DAAD fellow (1999) in University of Bonn, Germany, Visiting Scientist (2003-2005) University of Pittsburgh, U.S.A., Golden Peacock Award- 2008, Prof. V.P. Bhide Memorial Award -2008, CSIR Technology Award -1999 & 2015, Outstanding Scientist Award-2010, Dr. S. L. Mishra Medal 2011, Young Achiever Award-2014, Prof. R.K. Srivastava Memorial Oration Award 2015, Prof. H. S. Srivastava Memorial Award -2015, Prof. J.F. Dastur Memorial Award-2017, Prof. H.M. Shah Memorial Award-2017 Dr. Manmohan Attavar Gold Medal in Floriculture-2017, Plant Pathology Leadership Award-2017, Dr. M.R. Siddiqi Memorial Award-2018 and Prof. Uma Kant Sinha Memorial Award-2021 etc. He is President of Indian Phytopathological Society (2022-23), IARI, New Delhi. Dr. Pandey Guided 13 Ph.D. Students and several M.Sc /M.Tech students. He has been awarded several projects from national funding agencies. Dr. Pandey is Expert and Task Force member of DST, DBT, CSIR and ICAR for crop protection related projects and selections.
