Dr. Anirudh Kumar, PhD, is a research faculty member in the Department of Botany, Indira Gandhi National Tribal University (IGNTU), Amarkantak, MP, India. Over a 10 plus year career as a researcher in the area of plant molecular biology and plant pathology. During 2015-2016, he was working at CCMB, Hyderabad as DBT-Research Associate. He received M.Sc. and Ph.D. from University of Hyderabad, India. His current research interests span from antioxidants studies of medicinal plants to plant pathology. He is author and co-author of several papers on different aspect of plant biology. He also teaches courses for B.Sc., M. Sc. and Ph.D. degree. For the past few years, his research group is trying to studies phytochemical profiles of native plants traditionally used by tribal healers of Amarkantak, MP, India. Dr. Rakesh Kumar is a plant biologist and researcher, currently working as assistant professor in School of Life Sciences, University of Karnataka, India. He has obtained his PhD in plant sciences from University of Hyderabad, and an alumnus of International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Patancheru, India. During his past 11 years of research, he has worked in the area of molecular plant biotechnology and crop improvement. His expertise includes genomics and OMICS approaches such as mutagenesis, TILLING, Eco-TILLING, transcriptomics, sequencing, QTL-seq, trait and gene discovery, and LC-MS and GC-MS based proteomics and metabolomics. He has published several high impact research papers, reviews, book chapters and obtained research grants from both national and international funding agencies. Dr. Pawan Shukla is Scientist in Central Silk Board, Ministry of Textile, Govt. of India, Bangalore since 2015. He obtained his M.Sc. and Ph.D. from University of Hyderabad. He was Dr. D. S. Kothari post-doctoral fellow at University of Hyderabad during 2014-2015. He is having 12 years of experiences of working in the area of plant molecular biology and genetic engineering. During his Ph.D., he developed a plant gene-based pollination control system which has practical implication in hybrid seed production. In addition to this, he worked on the development of transgenic plants tolerance to different abiotic and biotic stresses. At present, he is associated with the biotechnology division of Central Sericultural Research & Training Institute (CSR&TI), Central Silk Board, Pampore, Kashmir, J&K (UT) and His laboratory is working on the development of cold tolerant mulberry variety. He has published several research papers in reputed International & National Journals and editor in 03 books published by CSR&TI, Central Silk Board Pampore. Dr. Hitendra Kumar Patel completed his master degree in Biotechnology from Guru Ghasidas Central University, Chhattisgarh and PhD in Molecular Life Sciences from International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, Trieste, Italy. He is currently leading the rice functional genomics group at CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CSIR-CCMB), Hyderabad, India. His research activities are focused on developing novel rice varieties and also on understanding the mechanisms of the interactions between plants and their pathogens. He was involved in the identification and characterization of several virulence functions including EPS, LPS, Cell wall degrading enzymes (CWDEs) and T3SS effector proteins of bacterial pathogen Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae. He was involved in popularization and licensing of Improved Samba Mahsuri rice; a bacterial blight disease resistant and low GI (diabetic-friendly) rice for which the team has won prestigious CSIR Technology award and DBT award. He is an associate editor for Science India portal and recognizing his contribution, he has been selected as Associate Fellow of Telangana, India.
