Biographical note

Prof. (Dr.) Aryadeep Roychoudhury is currently serving as Professor in the Discipline of Life Sciences, School of Sciences, Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), New Delhi. Before joining IGNOU, he worked as Assistant Professor at the Post Graduate Department of Biotechnology, St. Xavier’s College (Autonomous), Kolkata. Prof. Roychoudhury did B.Sc. (Honours) in Botany from Presidency College, Kolkata, and M.Sc. in Biophysics and Molecular Biology from University of Calcutta. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in Science from Bose Institute, Kolkata under Jadavpur University in the area of Plant Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. He has been associated with the molecular regulation of late embryogenesis abundant genes and the basic leucine zipper group of transcription factors, governing salt tolerance in rice. His post doctoral research was based on translational research on transgenic rice with enhanced salt and drought tolerance. His current research interests include physiological and molecular responses and cell signaling of plants during diverse abiotic stresses including fluoride, heavy metals, salinity and drought. He holds 23 years of research experience in the concerned discipline. Prof. Roychoudhury has handled several government-funded projects on abiotic stress responses in rice and supervised five Ph.D. students as sole principal investigator. To date, he has published over 260 articles in peer- reviewed journals and chapters in books of international and national repute. He has already edited 14 books from reputed publishers and has also guest edited special issues in several renowned international journals. Prof. Roychoudhury is the recipient of the Young Scientist Award 2019, conferred by the International Foundation for Environment and Ecology, at the University of Allahabad, Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh, India. His name is included in the Stanford University’s List of World’s Top 2% Most Influential Scientists Dr. Durgesh Kumar Tripathi is currently an Associate Professor at Amity Institute of Organic Agriculture, Amity University Uttar Pradesh, Noida, India. He is the recipient of ‘Dr DS Kothari Post-Doctoral Fellowship’ of the UGC, New Delhi. Dr. Tripathi has received his D.Phil. in Science from University of Allahabad, India. During this period, Dr. Tripathi worked extensively on phytolith analysis, crop stress physiology, agro-nanotechnology and molecular biology. He has expertise on laser spectroscopy. His research interests encompass stress tolerance mechanisms in plants. Presently, he is working with nano-materials and their interactions with plants to find out their detoxification mechanisms, he is also working on Silicon, Nitric oxide and hormonal crosstalk against abiotic stress in plants.