Ahmed (PhD, 1987, Mines ParisTech, France) is Retired Professor, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad, India. An earth scientist, he worked extensively on groundwater hydrology in his 37 years’ career at CSIR- National Geophysical Research Institute, Hyderabad. Later he was Chair Professor in Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi. He led a large number of national and international projects on Earth science including the National Aquifer Mapping, India using heli-borne geophysics. He has about 200 SCI publications and supervised 40 doctoral students. He is Secretary of the Asian-GWADI. His awards include National Geoscience Award, International Prize for Water Sciences, National Mineral Award, INC-IAH Excellence Award, NGRI-AHI National Lecture Award, IGU-Annie Talwani Memorial Prize, Young Scientist Award. He is Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences of India. Ahmed has led the Indo-French Centre for Groundwater Research in Hyderabad for almost two decades as its founder head. He has been visiting Fellow to the Aligarh Muslim University and visiting professor to Kashmir University, India. Presently he is Consultant in Islamic University of Science and Technology, Kashmir

Badshah earned his PhD in 1994 from Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU), Islamabad. He is Vice Chancellor of the University of Buner and Ex-Professor Emeritus and Dean of the Faculty of Natural Sciences, QAU, Islamabad. He is a Fellow of Pakistan Academy of Sciences (PAS); Chemical Society, Pakistan; and Associate Editor of the Journal of Chemical Society of Pakistan. His prizes include Research Productivity Award from Pakistan Council for Science and Technology (2001-16); Gold Medal from PAS; Best Teacher and Best Paper Awards from Higher Education Commission, Pakistan; and Tamgha-i-Imtiaz (TI) from Government of Pakistan.

Chatterjee is a Professor of Pharmacology, Institute of Postgraduate Medical Education and Research, Kolkata, India. Upon completing her MBBS and MD from University of Calcutta, she received her PhD from Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India. Her work as a medical immunopharmacologist includes multiple aspects of Leishmania biology that includes (i) delineating the immunopathology of Post Kala-azar Dermal Leishmaniasis (PKDL), a disease unique to South Asia, and especially challenging as it has no animal model; (ii) development of diagnostic/prognostic objective molecular tools for monitoring anti-leishmanial therapy; and (iii) studying redox-dysfunction as an effective leishmanicidal approach. In sum, the thrust of Chatterjee’s work is translational research in Indian Leishmaniasis with a view towards facilitating a greater understanding of disease pathogenesis through worldwide collaborations across geographic borders, and supporting the ongoing kala-azar elimination programme. She is a member of four Indian science academies and has over 175 publications in leading International journals (Clin Infect Dis, J Invest Dermatol, J Clin Invest, J Inf Dis).

Dube , an ex-Csir JC Bose National Fellow, is an Emeritus Scientist of the Indian National Science Academy at Central Drug Research Institute, Lucknow, India. Her research focus is on the endemic organism Leishmania sp., a protozoan parasite causing Kala-azar, a neglected tropical disease and a major health problem in pockets in the Indian sub-continent. She identified novel vaccine and drug targets using functional genomics and proteomics, leading to the development of indigenous protein vaccines. This also led to the detection of new biomarkers for drug resistance in Leishmania. She developed and established the first non-human primate model for preclinical evaluation of a potential antileishmanial drug/vaccine, and generated fluorescent Leishmania organism for rapid drug screening which were recognized nationally and internationally. Member of the three Indian science academies and one Indian medical academy, she has received awards such as Sir J.C. Bose National Fellowship, Indian Council of Medical Research Kshanika Oration, and Dr. B.N. Singh Memorial Oration among others.

Egamberdieva is the Head of the research group at the Faculty of Biology, National University of Uzbekistan. She received her PhD in agricultural sciences from the Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany. On the national level she has played a leading role in the implementation and evaluation of the national programmes and projects in agricultural research for sustainable development, and acts as a Chair of the Executive Committee of the OWSD Central Asia National Chapter, and Vice-Chair and National Focal Point Representative to the UNESCO-STEPAN (Science and Technology Policy Asian Network). Egamberdieva is also involved in science policy, and served on the advisory committee of the German Council of Science and Humanities (WR). She currently serves on the High-Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition (HLPE), the science-policy interface of the UN Committee on World Food Security, and also acts as the Country Ambassador for the American Society for Microbiology (ASM). She is a member of the Global Young Academy (GYA). In 2023 she has been awarded with UNESCO Carlos Finley Prize for Microbiology.

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.

Jha is a Professor Emeritus at Tribhuvan University and a foremost ecologist of Nepal. He is credited for developing the ecology discipline in Nepal, and creating a strong network of ecologists in South Asia. He was born in Nepal in 1953 and completed his education in India, including MSc and PhD. He joined Tribhuvan University as Assistant Lecturer in 1976, retired as Professor in 1997, and appointed Professor Emeritus in 2017. He led the Botany discipline in Nepal as Head of the Central Department of Botany for almost a decade, taught at the post-graduate level for four decades, established a culture of research and publication, and inspired young botanists in the country for research. Jha is credited with supervising 11 PhD students at Tribhuvan University in the Institute of Science and Technology, the highest number in that institute. In addition, he has served as a reviewer of nearly five dozen PhD theses in Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Australia. Jha is an Academician of Nepal Academy of Science and Technology. He has made significant contributions toward understanding the ecology and environment of Nepal.

Mahadevan (PhD, 1998, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore) is a condensed matter theorist working as a Professor at the S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, Kolkata, in India. She is a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Science, and was a Member of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) C20 Commission on Computational Physics from 2015 to 2021. She has been a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials as well as of ACS Energy Letters since 2021. She was a recipient of the NASI (National Academy of Sciences, India)-Scopus Young Scientist Award in 2010 and of the TWOWS Award for Young Women Scientists in physics/mathematics in Asia region in 2010. Her research interests involve using a combination of ab-initio and model Hamiltonian methods in understanding properties of materials - with a focus on electronic structure and magnetism.

Mitra is a Professor, Machine Intelligence Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. She was in the Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule (RWTH), Aachen, Germany (1992–94) as a Fellow under the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). She was Visiting Professor at Computer Science Department, University of Alberta, Canada; Meiji University, Japan; and Aalborg University Esbjerg, Denmark. Mitra received the National Talent Search Scholarship (1978–1983) from National Council of Educational Research and Training, India; the University Gold Medal (1988); the Outstanding Paper Award (1994) by Transactions on Neural Networks, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), for her pioneering work in neuro-fuzzy computing, the CIMPA-INRIA-UNESCO Fellowship (1996), and Fulbright-Nehru Senior Research Fellowship (2018–2020). She was the Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE) Chair Professor 2018–2020. Mitra has been awarded the prestigious J. C. Bose National Fellowship, 2021. She is a Fellow of IEEE, Indian National Science Academy (INSA), International Association for Pattern Recognition (IAPR), Fellow of INAE, and of National Academy of Sciences, India (NASI).