Ashwani Pareek
Ashwani Pareek (born 27 September 1969 in Delhi and native of Sambhar Lake, Rajasthan, India) is Executive Director of NABI a prominent plant biologist and educator noted chiefly for his contribution in plant molecular biology and biotechnology. He is currently working as Professor of plant molecular biology and biotechnology at the School of Life Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and adjunct professor at the University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia. He is a recipient of several honors including the Visitors award for Technology Development from the President of India for developing Stress Tolerant Rice of the Next  Generation (STRONG) that has the potential to enhance the income of rice farmers. The award ceremony was held at the Rashtrapati Bhawan on 2 May 2018. Recently on 26 February 2020, he has been awarded "Tata Innovation Award 2020" by Department of Biotechnology, Govt of India. He has interest in understanding the physiological and molecular adaptations in xero-halophytic plants and development of transgenic rice plants with enhanced tolerance towards multiple abiotic stresses. Education and professional career. Pareek received bachelor's degree (1987-1990) in botany and master's degree (1990-1992) in plant molecular biology from the University of  Delhi. He then joined the laboratory of Professor Anil Grover at the same university in 1992 for doctoral research (PhD) work on ‘Molecular Characterization of stress proteins in "Oryza sativa" L. with emphasis on 90 kDa family’. After receiving PhD degree, Pareek received the prestigious Post Doctoral Fellowship by The Rockefeller Foundation, New York and worked with Professor Ralph S.Quatrano at the University of North Carolina, USA during 1997-98.He then accepted the assignment of Research Scientist at Department of Genetics, University of Delhi South Campus in late 1998. In May, 2001, Pareek was awarded BOYSCAST Fellowship to work with  Professor Hans Bohnert at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, USA. Thereafter in 2005, he was awarded the INSA-Royal visiting scientist fellowship to work at University of Cambridge, U.K. Pareek joined Jawaharlal Nehru University in 2003 and presently serving there as a Professor of plant molecular biology. In 2012, he was conferred the DBT-Overseas visiting fellowship(CREST) to work at The University of California, Davis, USA. In 2017, he was appointed as Adjunct Professor at the University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia. Research publications and books. Ashwani has authored and published more than 150 research papers/articles in  the research journals. Some of these journals include Nature, Journal of Experimental Botany, Plant Physiology, The Plant Journal, Plant, Cell & Environment etc. He has edited/ co-edited three books like ‘Abiotic Stress Adaptation in Plants: Physiological, Molecular and Genomic Foundation’, ‘Biotechnology in Medicine and Agriculture: Principles and Practices’. and ‘Pre-Field Screening Protocols for Heat Tolerant Mutants in Rice’. Patents and technology transfer. Pareek has many patents in the field of plant genetic engineering. Some of them are :