Biofortification of Grain and Vegetable Crops

Dr. Muhammad Tehseen Azhar is working as Associate Professor at the Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad-Pakistan, where his primary responsibility is teaching to graduate and post-graduate classes. Besides, his focus is screening and development of segregating population resulting in the development of several bulks of cotton with more yield and fibre traits. Dr Azhar has specific interest in the development of cotton germplasm having tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses. These advanced strains of cotton have showed good performance for yield of cotton in national traits and those genotypes are suitable for cultivation in high temperature and water stress conditions. Being a Borlaug Alumnus, he worked with various cotton geneticists namely, Dr Richard Percy, Dr Lori L. Hinze and Dr Jame Frelichowsk at Texas A&M University and USDA-ARS, USA. Dr Azhar has completed various research projects funded by Higher Education Commission, Pakistan; CAS-PARB and Cooperation Organization Partnership for Science and Technology, China. Besides, Dr Azhar is Endeavour Alumnus and appointed as Adjunct Lecturer at the School of Plant Biology, UWA. Recently he is appointed as Adjunct Associate Professor, School of Agriculture Sciences, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, China. Due to his consistency Dr Azhar is appointed as a Chair (20219-2021) of Germplam and Genetic Stock in International Cotton Genome Initiative (ICGI). He is winner of ASIA Young Scientist Innovation Gold Medal-2023 from International Cotton Researchers Association (ICRA), a sub-committee of International Cotton Advisory Committee (ICAC), Washington.

Dr. Muhammad Qadir Ahmad is working as an Assistant Professor at the Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Pakistan. He earned his PhD degree from the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan, in 2013. Additionally, he gained experience as a scholar at the Genomics and Gene Discovery Research Unit, Western Regional Research Center at the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), California. Later, Dr. Ahmad worked as a research assistant at Xuzhou Institute of Agricultural Sciences/Xuzhou Sweetpotato Research Centre, Jiangsu, China, and he now holds the position of adjunct associate professor at this institute. He teaches different courses to undergraduate and postgraduate students of Plant Breeding and Genetics. He is actively involved in field and laboratory experiments, and over a period of time, he has screened wheat germplasm stocks against heat and drought stresses. He has also developed various breeding populations of wheat.