Fungal Biopolymers and Biocomposites: Prospects and Avenues

Mukund V. Deshpande obtained his Ph.D. in 1982 in Biochemistry and D.Sc. in Microbiology from the University of Pune in 1994. He has been working extensively on the use of fungi and fungal products in Biotechnology. Dr. Deshpande successfully completed more than 35 research projects funded by national and international funding agencies like Indo-Swiss Collaboration in Biotechnology (ISCB) for the development of mycoinsecticide, Indo-Belarus programme of DBT on biopesticides, Indo-Mexico programme on fungal dimorphism, to name a few. Dr. Deshpande is an elected fellow of Maharashtra Academy of Sciences (FMASc, 1994) and the Society for Biocontrol Advancement (FSBA, 2010). He has to his credit more than 160 research papers, reviews and chapters, 8 patents, 8 books and a number of popular articles. He has his own start-up Greenvention Biotech located in Uruli-Kanchan, Pune for the translational activities in Agricultural Biotechnology. 

 Dr. Kandikere R. Sridhar is an adjunct professor in the Department of Biosciences, Mangalore University. His main areas of research are “Diversity and Ecology of Fungi of the Western Ghats, Mangroves and Marine Habitats”. He was an NSERC postdoctoral fellow/visiting professor at Mount Allison University, Canada; Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ and Martin Luther University, Germany; Center of Biology, University of Minho, Portugal. He was the recipient of The Shome Memorial Award (2004), became Vice-President (2013), President (2018), and Lifetime Achievement Awardee (2019) by the Mycological Society of India. He was a recipient of The Fellow of Indian Mycological Society, Kolkata (2014), Distinguished Asian Mycologist (2015), and Outstanding Leader in Education and Research, Association of Agricultural Technology of Southeast Asia (2016). He was awarded the UGC-BSR Faculty Fellowship (2014-2017). He is one of the world’s top 2% scientists in the field of mycology (2020-21). He has over 450 publications and edited eight books.