Shakoori is professor emeritus, dist. natl. prof. and director, School of Biological Sciences, U. of the Punjab, Lahore and prof. of cell biology at the U. of Massachusetts Medical Centre, Worcester. He obtained his Dr.rer.nat. from the U. of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, 1972. He has been co-dir., Centre of Advanced Mol. Biology, and chair. of the dpts. of zoology and microbiology and molecular genetics at the U. of the Punjab. He was awarded Pakistan's Highest Academic Award, Aizaz-i-Kamal; Dist. Scientist of the Year Award 2011 in Zoology, Pakistan Acad. of Sciences; the Civil Award Tamgha-i-Imtiaz and Scientist of the Year Award by the Min. of Ed., Pakistan. He has been a senior Fulbright fellow, senior DAAD fellow and obtained a fellowship from the Royal Soc. (1999). He is fellow of the Pakistan Academy of Sciences and life fellow and pres. of the Zoological Society of Pakistan (2002-2006).He received Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) Excellence Award in Science & Technology in 2012

Narasimha joined the dept. of aeronautics at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) after obtaining a PhD from the California Institute of Technology. He is DST Year-of-Science Prof. of the Engineering Mechanics Unit at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bangalore. He has several times been Clark B Millikan Prof. at Caltech, and was Jawaharlal Nehru Prof. at Cambridge in 1989-90. His awards include: Fluid Dynamics Prize, AIAA; Bhatnagar Award; Ramanujan Medal (Indian Science Congress); and Life-time Contribution to Engineering, Indian National Acad. of Engineering. His membership includes: Fellow, Royal Society of London and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics; foreign associate, US National Acad. of Sciences and US National Acad. of Engineering; and foreign hon. member, American Acad. of Arts and Sciences. He won the Trieste Science Prize in 2008. He was awarded the Padma Vibhushan in 2013.

Chandrashekar is prof., Indian Inst. of Technology (IIT), Kanpur, India. He was previously: Dir., Natl. Inst. of Science Education and Research (NISER), Bhubaneswar. Presently he has taken over the charge of Secretary, Science and Engineering Research Board, Dept. of Science and Technology, New Delhi (since 2013). He has made significant contributions in the area of molecular receptors for neutral, cationic and anionic substrates, photosensitizer for photodynamic therapy, model compounds for photosynthetic intermediates, catalysts for organic conversions and supramolecular systems for molecular devices. His awards include: SS Bhatnagar Prize; Prof. P. Ray Memorial Award; CRSI bronze and silver medals; Homi Bhabha Award; and JC Bose National Fellowship, Dept. of Science and Technology, New Delhi, India. He is an elected fellow of all three national science academies of India.

Rozikov (PhD, 1995, D.Sc., 2001, Tashkent) is Professor, Institute of Mathematics, Tashkent. His prizes and fellowships include prize of TWAS for Young Scientists; TWAS Young Affiliate; TWAS Research Grant; Prize of Japan Embassy in Tashkent; Medal "Uzbekiston Belgisi", Uzbekistan; Fellowship of IHES, France; NATO Reintegration Grant; The Royal Society grant, Cambridge, UK; Medal "The excellent teacher" of Uzbekistan; CNR-Fellowship grant of Italian CNR; Junior Associate of ICTP, Italy; Visiting professor of University Santiago de Compostela, Spain, University of Geneva, Switzerland, Universite du Sud Toulon Var, France, Ruhr University, Bochum, Germany, University Paris-Est, Paris, France; DFG grant, Germany; CNRS fellowship, Centre de Physique Theorique, Marseille, France; Residence of IMeRA, Marseille, France; grant of London Mathematical Society; State prize of the government of Uzbekistan; Springer Nature TOP Author Award for high publication activity.