Dr. Reddi is Dean of Graduate School and a Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering. His research is highly interdisciplinary spanning such themes as geoenvironmental engineering, plant-soil-water interactions, seepage through porous media, and biomimetics. His 25-year long academic career has included collaborations with researchers across many disciplines, including Agricultural Sciences, Agronomy, Architecture, Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Physics, Biomedical Engineering, Entomology, and Agronomy. He has secured nearly eight million dollars in external funding from federal agencies (NSF, NASA, FHWA, EPA), state agencies and regional centers, and local industries. Author or editor/co-editor of eight books, over 100 journal publications, 200 presentations (made in about twenty five countries), Dr. Reddi is Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and Fellow of the American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS). Among his numerous recognitions and honors are: James Robinson Outstanding Teacher, Outstanding Researcher (at Kansas State University), Outstanding Department Chair (at Kansas State University), Outstanding Alumnus of Ohio State University, and Excellence in Leadership Award of Central Florida Engineering Chapters.

Plant-soil-water interactions, Geoenvironmental Engineering, Seepage Through Porous Media, and Biomimetics

Dr. Samir C. Debnath is a Research Scientist at the Atlantic Cool Climate Crop Research Centre of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) in St. John’s, NL and an Adjunct Professor of Biology at the Memorial University of Newfoundland. He had been trained and worked in Bangladesh (Professor of Genetics and Plant Breeding), India (Ph.D. in maize breeding; 1978-82), Germany (Postdoc on potato biotechnology; 1984-86) and in UK (Postdoc on lettuce transformation; 1993-94) before he joined AAFC St. John’s Research Centre, in May, 1996. He has authored and co-authored more than 100 publications in peer-reviewed journals including review papers and book chapters, in plant propagation, biotechnology and breeding. He has been a keynote speaker and an invited speaker at a number of international and national conferences and meetings, was the President of the Newfoundland and Labrador Institute of Agrologists (P.Ag.) and is the President of the Canadian Society for Horticultural Science and the Country (Canada) Representative and Council Member of the International Society for Horticultural Science. Much of his current work focuses on wild germplasm improvement of berry crops and medicinal plants using in vitro (bioreactor micropropagation, in vitro selection) and molecular techniques (clonal fidelity, genetic diversity, marker-assisted selection) combined with conventional methods.

Plant Science

Devi Prasad Juvvadi is Director (Agriculture Management) at Centre for Good Governance (CGG), Hyderabad, India. Earlier he was Team Leader and M&E specialist to A.P. Community Based Tank Management project in minor irrigation of Andhra Pradesh funded by World Bank. He worked as Lead Consultant. SPIU (Agriculture) with CGG and involved in change and delivery projects, capacity building and change management programmes to various government departments under Delivery of Improved Services in Administration (DISA), a DFID supported programme. He served as Member, Board of Management, A.P. Horticultural University. In the decades of eighties, Mr. Prasad worked as Asst. Professor (Soil Science) with American University of Beirut and adjunct to teaching and research programmes in Saudi Arabia for about 10 years. He was Consultant to many agriculture projects in several countries in the Middle East and Europe. He returned to India in early nineties and associated with finance and industrial activity and moved to NGO sector as Consultant and conducted various studies in agricultural and rural development to UN, Netherlands and Swiss, funded projects. He has been a trainer, resource person and consultant to many organizations including EPTRI, EEI, SAMETI, APWELL, APIDC, SBI, MIDHANl, DANIDA, BHEL, DMRL, DRDL etc. He has authored and co-authored peer reviewed articles and published bulletins, contributed to news papers on agriculture and presented papers in various national and international conferences. His areas of interest include Agricultural Governance, Risk Management in Agriculture, ICT use in agriculture, Capacity building and Change management in agriculture. Mr. Prasad travelled widely in over 24 countries in Europe, Africa, North and South America, Australia and Asia including Pakistan.

Horticulture, Soil Science

Prof. Romaine Ramananarivo is full Professor at Ecole Supérieure des Sciences Agronomiques of The University of Antananarivo. She was the first Responsible of the PhD training in Agro-Management Area since 2002 and she is the Deputy Manager of ISCAM (Institut Supérieur de la Communication, des Affaires et du Management since 2007. She is member of International Society for Horticultural Science and is reviewer of some international journals.

Rural development, Value chain in horticultural area, Organization and Finance in firms

Mohammad Pessarakli,has completed his Ph.D. at the age of 32 from University of Arizona and postdoctoral studies from the same University,Soil and Water Sciences Department. He is a Research Professor in the School of Plant Sciences, same University. He has published over120 papers in reputed journals, 20 book chapters, 4reference books: Handbook of Plant/Crop Stress (1993,1999,2010), Handbook of Plant/Crop Physiology (1994,1999), Handbook of Photosynthesis (1997,2005), and Handbook of Turfgrass Management/Physiology (2007), and serving as an Editorial Board member of Plant Nutrition Journal, Communications in Soil Science and Plant Analysis, and Crop Science Book Advisory Committee member.

Research focused on the adaptation of plants/crops and turfgrass species/genotypes/cultivars to environmental (salinity, drought, and heat) stresses, screening various plants/crops and turfgrasses for stress tolerances in hydroponics culture in the greenhouse as well as in the field.

Sundara Rajan has a Fellowship in Marketing from Delft University (RVB), Nederlands, also holds a MBA from AIMA, Delhi, in addition to his PG Dip. In Advertising and Sales Management from Bhavans College of Mass Communications, Chennai. His past experiences encompasses many industries, which includes Food, FMCG, Media, Housing Infrastructure, IT services.. He also provides Consultancy Services and some of the prestigious assignments being handled by him are:
♦ Integrated Agri Services Programme – Media Lab Asia, Min. of IT, Govt. of India
♦ PG Dip. In IT for Agriculture – IIIT, Hyderabad
♦ Agri Marts – World Bank Project – Dept. of Marketing, Govt. of AP
♦ Rural Resources Information Centers – Council for Rural Institutions, Min. of HR, GOI
♦ Ramky Group – Food Park
♦ Integrated Food Processing Zone – IFFCO/ Yes Bank
♦ Advisor – “Choices Pvt Ltd” – Rural Retail network for equipments
♦ Mentor – National Agri Business Incubator
♦ Agri Business Expert – Business Exchange – Times of India initiative

Agri Business, ICT for Agriculture and Rural Development

Abdul Rahman Ilyas, born 23rd May 1973, started his professional career in 1995 soon after finishing his post graduation in business management and in a span of 18 years he has worked in diverse sectors and organization setups. He decided to make his career in the development sector as early as 1999 and built his career in core agribusiness development. Worked for a State Government of Andhra Pradesh as OSD – Marketing and Processing and went on become the COO of Agri-Science Park for ICRISAT (a CGIAR Center headquartered in India).
Through his career span he has worked with smallholder farmers, progressive farmer, stakeholders from varied sectors – horticulture, dairy, aquaculture and agribusiness. His core expertise is institutional innovations, sustainable business modeling and research / technology outreach. Widely traveled on missions and work, with contacts spread across globally from academia, private sector and research institutions in USA, Africa, Asia and Middle East, he has helped various organizations with strategic advise and custom facilitations. Lead industry missions abroad for technology and research collaborations and vice versa. He is on various national and internationals committees / action groups that work in the agricultural / agribusiness spectrum. Supported ventures in Gherkins, Organic Farming, bio diesel, nutraceuticals and agricultural extension.
Currently he is CEO of IKP Center for Advancement of Agricultural Practice (ICAAP), a center promoted by International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Washington and ICICI Knowledge Park Trust, India. ICAAP is developing a knowledge platform which, will be supported by the Centers of Excellence to showcase innovative technologies, global best practices and scalable models that can benefit small holders at large.

Horticulture, dairy, aquaculture and agribusiness

Dr. Irfan Ali Khan obtained his M.Sc. from Aligarh Muslim University and PhD in Botany from Osmania University, Hyderabad, specializing in ‘Genetics and Plant Breeding’. He was the Former Director of Nawab Shah Alam Khan Centre for Post Graduate Studies and Research (Osmania University), Anwarul Uloom College Campus, Hyderabad, India. He has 163 research publications in the reputed National and International Journals and is now on the panel of ‘Experts on Mung bean’ for all countries of the South-East Asia and the Middle East. He has been the Editor of “Frontiers in Plant Science”, and has edited 74 reference books and has co-authored 3 text books with his wife, Dr. Atiya Khanum. He is a Fellow of the Indian Society of Genetics (F.I.S.G.). Besides this, he serves as the Editor-in-Chief of “Annals of Phytomedicine - An International Journal”.

Genetics and Plant Breeding, Biostatistics

Dr. Wang, obtained his B.S. degree from Hunan Normal University in 1988, then at his hometown he worked as a middle school teacher for two years, and continued his graduate study in the Institute of Genetics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) for three years. After working in CAS as an assistant researcher for five years, he moved to Singapore for research work and Ph.D. study. He received his Ph.D. degree from National University of Singapore in 2006, and then joined NIA/NIH in USA for postdoctoral training. In 2010, He was employed as a professor by Hunan Agricultural University, China. Also, He obtained Special Grade Invention Prize of Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1998, and published more than ten papers in high impact journals such as PLOS Genet, Plant Cell, Plant Physiology and Journal of Virology.

1. Ubiquitin ligase mediated resistance to abiotic and biotic stresses in plants.
2. DNA damage and repair in plants.

D.K. Grover completed his Ph..D in 1988, presently working as Director of Agro–Economic Research Centre at the internationally renowned Punjab Agricultural University in India - with major mandate of advising Indian/Punjab Government on various agro-socio economic issues. He gained work experience of about 25 years in the field of Agricultural/ Socio Economics; both at National/ international levels. He has published one research book and contributed more than 125 research papers, published in the referred journals of national/ international repute. He has been Visiting Fellow/Scientist at AVRDC- World Vegetable Centre, Taiwan, International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), Philippines and International Food policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Washington, DC, USA and as World Bank Consultant of Agricultural Economics under Agricultural Research and Training Project at Alemaya University of Agriculture, Ethiopia. He has also been a member of several expert panels/committees/ editorial boards and interdisciplinary teams both at National/international level along with session chairman/discussant in many international conferences.

Agricultural Economics

Ali Ghasemzadeh Daghigh was born in Talesh (Iran) in 1977. He has a Ph.D degree in Environmental Plant Physiology (Ecophysiology) from University Putra Malaysia. He is currently researcher in field of Ecophysiology at the University Putra Malaysia. He teaches in courses on Agronomy, Crop Ecology, Physiology, Medicinal plants and supervises MSc and Ph.D students.

Interested in research work related to effect of environmental factors on medicine compounds of herbs. Also on climate changes and Its effects on plant physiology is in my field.

Vijaya K.Kanna completed his B.Sc from Delhi Univesity, M.Sc Genetics and Ph.D from H.A.U., Hisar, Haryana and he is FAO of UN Fellow in The University of Queensland, Australia. He has published 55 research papers in the Journal of International level and 85 in National Journals.

Interspecific hybridization for gene transfer in cultivated crops, embryo rescue, tissue culture, molecular markers and marker assisted selection, transgenics.

Songbiao Chen received his Ph.D. degree from the Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2005. He conducted his post-doctoral research at The Ohio State University from 2005 to 2009, and then worked as a senior research associate at The Ohio State University from 2009 to 2010. He is a professor at the Biotechnology Research Institute, Fujian Academy of Agricultural Sciences, China. His research programs focus on plant disease resistance, plant functional genomics, and crop molecular breeding.

Plant disease resistance, plant functional genomics, and crop molecular breeding

Nnadozie Oraguzie received his PhD in Plant breeding and genetics at Lincoln University, New Zealand and worked for a year as a Post-Doctoral researcher at Canterbury University, Christchurch, New Zealand, before joining Plant and Food Research (PFR) Institute, New Zealand as Research Scientist in 1998. At PFR, he was the Manager of the national pome fruit germplasm collection and an Objective Leader in the Pome fruit breeding consortium program. With the help of a fellowship from the Science and Technology Agency (STA) of Japan in 2001, he led an international collaboration including PFR, Hirosaki University and the National Institute of Tree Fruit Science, Morioka, Japan, that first linked an allele of the Md-ACS1 gene to fruit softening in apple. He was also the recipient of an Invitation Fellowship from the Japan Ministry of Science and Technology in 2006. He joined the faculty of Washington State University (WSU) in 2008 as Associate Professor. He has authored over 40 peer-reviewed journal publications and a book, and currently serves on the editorial board of two journals.

His current research interests are at the interface of breeding and genomics. He leads the stone fruit breeding, genetics and extension program at WSU with emphasis on developing new sweet cherry varieties suited for growing in the PNW regions of the USA. He also has research interests in the genetics and genomics of traits that govern consumer appreciation of fresh fruit products in apple and pear.