Biographical note

Javid A Parray is currently teaching at the Department of Environmental Science, GDC Eidgah, affiliated to Cluster University, Srinagar. His research interests include ecological and agricultural microbiology, climate change, microbial biotechnology, and environmental microbiomes. He has also done his Post Doctorate Research from the University of Kashmir. Dr Parray was also awarded a Fast Track Young Scientist Project by SERB – DST, GoI New Delhi. Dr Javid was also awarded as “Emerging scientist year Gold Medal” for the year 2018 by Indian Academy of Environmental Science. Dr Parray is the course coordinator for the UG- Programmes for CeC-MOOCS Swayam in Environmental Science. Dr Parray is an expert review member in the field of environmental science in the CSTT, Ministry of Education, GoI New Delhi. Dr Niraj Singh holds a master's degree in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology and completed his PhD in Molecular Microbiology from the Department of M.B.B.T, Tezpur University, Assam India. After completing his Ph.D. Degree, Dr. Niraj Singh started his teaching career at the Department of Botany, North Eastern Hill University, Shillong, Meghalaya. India. He currently works at the Department of Microbiology, The Assam Royal Global University, Guwahati, Assam as an Assistant Professor & Coordinator/Head. His current area of research is R. solanacearum bacterial wilt disease in plants, Virulence gene function study of R. solanacearum, and its control in agronomically important crops. He has published quality research articles and book chapters. Dr. Niraj Singh was also awarded the Hayward-Prior Travel Award 2020 for Ralstonia solanacearum wilt research work, the Young Scientist Award, the Young Plant Pathologist Award, and the certificate of appreciation at Gujrat Vigyan Sammelan in 2022. Dilfuza Egamberdieva is a research associate at the Centre of Agricultural Landscape Research, Germany and head of Joint Uzbek-China Key Lab of Ecobiomes of Arid Lands, National University of Uzbekistan. Her research interests include microbial ecology and diversity, plant-microbe interaction, plant nutrition and stress tolerance, and plant biological disease control. She has been awarded the SCOPUS-2019 Award “Top Scientist of the Year”, TWAS (The World Academy of Science) Award in Agricultural Sciences (2013), and TWAS-TWOWS-SCOPUS Young Women Research Award (2009), as well as several Fellowships such as President’s International Fellowship for Visiting Professors (PIFI), The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), and the Georg Forster Research Fellowships, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. She is a member of several journals’ editorial board, authored seven books published by Elsevier and Springer, and co-authored over 200 publications in per reviewed journals.