Dr. Siddharth Tiwari is a Scientist-E at National Agri-Food Biotechnology Institute (NABI), Mohali, Punjab, India. He received his doctoral degree in 2008 from CSIR-National Botanical Research Institute (CSIR-NBRI), Lucknow, U.P., India. His area of specialization includes Plant Tissue Culture, Molecular Biology and Genetic Engineering. Two major contributions were derived from his doctoral research. The first one was the development of a groundnut-seed-expressed edible vaccine against cholera and rabies and he received BioAsia Innovation Young Scientist Award in 2010. The second outcome was the development of insect resistance transgenic groundnut against polyphagous foliage insect Spodoptera litura and he received the 97th Indian Science Congress Association (ISCA) Young Scientist Award in 2010. He joined DBT-NABI, in July 2010 and presently working as Scientist E. His lab is working on metabolic engineering of staple crops like banana and wheat for nutri^40 graduate/post-graduate students in the various disciplines of plant biotechnology. He has recently (Jan. 2023) elected as a fellow of the prestigious Plant Tissue Culture Association of India (PTCA(I)). Dr. Bhupendra Koul is an Associate Professor at the Department of Biotechnology, School of Bioengineering and Biosciences, Lovely Professional University (LPU), Punjab, India. During his Ph.D. at the Plant Transgenics Lab, CSIR-National Botanical Research Institute, Lucknow, he worked on the optimization, introduction, and expression of modified full-length and truncated versions of Bt-cry1Ab and 1Ac genes in tomato for developing non-chimeric and stable transgenic lines resistant to two lepidopteran insects (Helicoverpa armigera and Spodoptera litura) and evaluated the stability and efficacy of insecticidal toxin in transgenic plants. He has also optimized the regeneration and Agrobacterium-mediated transformation of Stevia (Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni) and has developed herbicide-resistant transgenic Stevia for effective weed-management in Stevia cultivation. He was awarded “CSIR-Senior Research Fellowship (SRF)” in the year 2013. He also has 9 years of teaching experience and received the “Teacher Appreciation Award 2016” from LPU in the Discipline of Biotechnology, through the MHRD Minister, Government of India. He has designed the full-length synthetic cry1Ac gene (GenBank: KP195020.1) and has published 57 research papers in national and international journals as well as 21 book chapters and 3 authored book with Springer Nature. He has guided 3 Ph.D. students and trained 20 post graduate students.
