Islam Md Tofazzal

Prof. Md Tofazzal Islam is the Dean of Faculty of Graduate Studies and Founding Director of the Institute of Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering (IBGE) at GAU, Bangladesh. He holds a PhD from Hokkaido University and completed prestigious fellowships including JSPS, Humboldt, Commonwealth, and Fulbright. A pioneer in climate-smart agrobiotechnology, he secured over $20M in grants to establish state-of-the-art research facilities. Dr. Islam gained global acclaim for leading the rapid response to the 2016 wheat blast outbreak using field pathogenomics and open science. His team developed a CRISPR-based diagnostic tool for the fungus and recently decoded the genome of year-round fruiting jackfruit. His discovery of 50+ novel bioactive metabolites offers new paths for disease management. With ~15,000 citations and an h-index of 62, he is a Fellow of the Bangladesh Academy of Sciences, American Phytopathological Society (USA), BAAG, and TWAS. His honors include the BAS Gold Medal and the Commonwealth Innovation Award. His research, funded by the Gates Foundation, IAEA/FAO, BBSRC, and World Bank, continues to address global food security through frontier genomics and genome editing.