Nagendra Kumar Singh
Encyclopedia
Dr Nagendra Kumar Singh is an eminent India
n agricultural scientist. He is presently a National Professor (Dr. B.P.Pal Chair) under ICAR at National Research Centre for Plant Biotechnology, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi. He was born in a small village called Rajapur in the Mau
District of Uttar Pradesh
. He is widely known for his research in the area of plant genomics and biotechnology
, particularly for his contribution in the decoding of rice, tomato and pigeonpea genomes and understanding of wheat seed storage proteins and their effect on wheat quality. He has also made significant advances in comparative analysis of rice and wheat genomes and mapping of genes for salt tolerance and basmati quality traits in rice.
and a daughter Mrs. Anuradha Singh who is married to Mr. Prashant Vikram who is pursuing his doctoral research at IRRI Manila.
He received his early education at the Primary Pathshala in Tilasawa village 1964-68, Junior High School, Jahanaganj 1969-71; matriculation and senior secondary from Wesley Higher Secondary School, Azamgarh
, 1971–75; He then did his B.Sc.(Ag.) 1978 and M.Sc. (Ag.) in Genetics and Plant Breeding in 1980 from Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University
, Varanasi. He was awarded gold medals by BHU for achieving position in the university in both B.Sc. (Ag.) and M.Sc. (Ag.). Immediately after completion of his post graduation from BHU, he moved to Adelaide
, Australia on a University of Adelaide Post Graduate Scholarship to pursue his Doctoral Degree which he eventually earned from Waite Agricultural Research Institute, University of Adelaide in 1985, his Ph. D. thesis topic was "Structure and Genetic control of endosperm proteins in wheat and rye" . There he was awarded Dr K.P. Barley Prize best post graduate student prize at the university in 1983. He was then awarded the prestigious CSIRO Post Doctoral Award in 1986 and the Queen Elizabeth II Award, by the Australian government in 1988 for his post doctoral research. He was offered a regular position as a research scientist at CSIRO, Sydney, but decided to come back to India to serve the Agricultural Science establishment in India as he was strongly influenced by the Self Reliance (Swadeshi) ideals of Mahatama Gandhi. Even today he works at the Indian Council for Agricultural Research with a motive to make India more self reliant in area of food security and crop improvement and for the welfare of farmers by playing a leading role in applying the power of Genomics revolution.
In 2011 Dr. Singh led a group of 31 scientists from all over India and sequenced the pigeon pea genome, it was first time that the genome of a legume was sequenced. The effort was a totally indigenous effort by scientists from ICAR, NRCPB, Banaras Hindu University
, Indian Institute of Pulse Research, UAS Dharwad and PDKV Akola. The First Draft of pigeon pea genome sequence was published in J. Plant Biochem Biotechnol.
His professional career began in 1981:
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
n agricultural scientist. He is presently a National Professor (Dr. B.P.Pal Chair) under ICAR at National Research Centre for Plant Biotechnology, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi. He was born in a small village called Rajapur in the Mau
Mau
Mau , formerly Mau Nath Bhanjan , nearly 90 km from Varanasi is the powerhouse of textile weavers in Eastern UP, India. It is a small industrial town on the banks of Ghaghra . The Tamasa river flows through the city...
District of Uttar Pradesh
Uttar Pradesh
Uttar Pradesh abbreviation U.P. , is a state located in the northern part of India. With a population of over 200 million people, it is India's most populous state, as well as the world's most populous sub-national entity...
. He is widely known for his research in the area of plant genomics and biotechnology
Biotechnology
Biotechnology is a field of applied biology that involves the use of living organisms and bioprocesses in engineering, technology, medicine and other fields requiring bioproducts. Biotechnology also utilizes these products for manufacturing purpose...
, particularly for his contribution in the decoding of rice, tomato and pigeonpea genomes and understanding of wheat seed storage proteins and their effect on wheat quality. He has also made significant advances in comparative analysis of rice and wheat genomes and mapping of genes for salt tolerance and basmati quality traits in rice.
Education and Personal Life
Dr N.K.Singh was born on October 15, 1958. His father Late Shri Indrasan Singh was a village level officer at a Block Development Office in Uttar Pradesh. His mother Smt. Prabhawati Devi is a home maker. He has one brother Shri Surendra Kumar Singh who is a poet, social worker and editor of a magazine "Chance" and one younger sister Ms. Gayatri Singh. He is married to Mrs Gita Singh who is a home maker and has two children Mr. Anand Singh who is pursuing his MBA from FMS, University of DelhiUniversity of Delhi
The University of Delhi is a central university situated in Delhi, India and is funded by Government of India. Established in 1922, it offers courses at the undergraduate and post-graduate level. Vice-President of India Mohammad Hamid Ansari is the Chancellor of the university...
and a daughter Mrs. Anuradha Singh who is married to Mr. Prashant Vikram who is pursuing his doctoral research at IRRI Manila.
He received his early education at the Primary Pathshala in Tilasawa village 1964-68, Junior High School, Jahanaganj 1969-71; matriculation and senior secondary from Wesley Higher Secondary School, Azamgarh
Azamgarh
Azamgarh is a town in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is headquarters of Azamgarh district and Azamgarh Division.-History:Azamgarh, one of the easternmost districts of the State, once formed a part of the ancient Kosala kingdom, except the north-eastern part of it which was included in the...
, 1971–75; He then did his B.Sc.(Ag.) 1978 and M.Sc. (Ag.) in Genetics and Plant Breeding in 1980 from Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University
Banaras Hindu University
Banaras Hindu University is a public university located in Varanasi, India and is one of the Central Universities of India. It is the largest residential university in Asia, with over 24,000 students in its campus. BHU was founded in 1916 by Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya under the Parliamentary...
, Varanasi. He was awarded gold medals by BHU for achieving position in the university in both B.Sc. (Ag.) and M.Sc. (Ag.). Immediately after completion of his post graduation from BHU, he moved to Adelaide
Adelaide
Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...
, Australia on a University of Adelaide Post Graduate Scholarship to pursue his Doctoral Degree which he eventually earned from Waite Agricultural Research Institute, University of Adelaide in 1985, his Ph. D. thesis topic was "Structure and Genetic control of endosperm proteins in wheat and rye" . There he was awarded Dr K.P. Barley Prize best post graduate student prize at the university in 1983. He was then awarded the prestigious CSIRO Post Doctoral Award in 1986 and the Queen Elizabeth II Award, by the Australian government in 1988 for his post doctoral research. He was offered a regular position as a research scientist at CSIRO, Sydney, but decided to come back to India to serve the Agricultural Science establishment in India as he was strongly influenced by the Self Reliance (Swadeshi) ideals of Mahatama Gandhi. Even today he works at the Indian Council for Agricultural Research with a motive to make India more self reliant in area of food security and crop improvement and for the welfare of farmers by playing a leading role in applying the power of Genomics revolution.
Professional Achievements
Dr N.K.Singh has worked world wide with researchers to improve various traits of crops like rice, wheat, pigeonpea and tomato. He has been a part of many national and international research projects in the area of plant biotechnology and genomics.In 2011 Dr. Singh led a group of 31 scientists from all over India and sequenced the pigeon pea genome, it was first time that the genome of a legume was sequenced. The effort was a totally indigenous effort by scientists from ICAR, NRCPB, Banaras Hindu University
Banaras Hindu University
Banaras Hindu University is a public university located in Varanasi, India and is one of the Central Universities of India. It is the largest residential university in Asia, with over 24,000 students in its campus. BHU was founded in 1916 by Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya under the Parliamentary...
, Indian Institute of Pulse Research, UAS Dharwad and PDKV Akola. The First Draft of pigeon pea genome sequence was published in J. Plant Biochem Biotechnol.
His professional career began in 1981:
- 1981-1988- Research Associate, University of Adelaide, Research on proteins in wheat, discovered a novel class of proteins in wheat seed and named it “Triticin”, Triticin is a legume-type storage protein present in the wheat seed in small quantity. It can be manipulated to increase the nutritional quality of wheat
- 1986-1991- Post Doctoral Research fellow and Queen Elizabeth II National Research Fellow at CSIRO Wheat Research Unit, SydneySydneySydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
and Waite Agricultural Research Institute, Adelaide, respectively. In this period he worked on the Use of sonication and size- exclusion HPLC for separation of wheat gluten proteins - 1991-1994- Scientist C, CFTRI, Mysore. Developed the Molecular Biology Unit at CFTRI
- 1994-2000- Associate Professor, GBPUAT, Pant Nagar. worked in areas of transgenic, isogenic and tissue culture filed two patents, introduced Ph.D. programme in Biotechnology during this period
- 2000-2010- Principal Scientist, NRCPB, IARI. Built the infrastructure for genomics research and was part of many national and international research projects on rice, tomato and pigeopea. Led the ICAR team of researchers of the International Rice Genome Sequencing project and led the research which got published in the reputed journal Nature. It was after many deacdes that any research work got published in the Nature Journal from Indian Agricultural Research Institute.
- 2010 - till present - National Professor, Dr B.P.Pal Chair ,IARI, ICAR .
Awards and recognition
- CSIRO Post-doctoral Award, CSIRO, Australia, 1986
- National Research Fellowship-Queen Elizabeth II Award, Department of Employment, Education and Training, Govt. of Australia, 1988
- Fellow of the Society, Indian Society of Genetics and Plant Breeding, New Delhi, 1998
- National Bioscience Award, DBT, Government Of IndiaGovernment of IndiaThe Government of India, officially known as the Union Government, and also known as the Central Government, was established by the Constitution of India, and is the governing authority of the union of 28 states and seven union territories, collectively called the Republic of India...
, New Delhi, 2002 - International Technology Award, World Technology Network, 2003
- Member, Scientific Panel of Crop Science Division, ICAR, 2004
- Member, DBT Task Force on Basic Research in Molecular Biology, 2004
- Vice President, Society of Plant Biochemistry and Biotechnology, New Delhi, India, 2006
- Fellow of the Academy, National Academy of Agricultural Sciences, New Delhi, India, 2007
- Rafi Ahmed Kidwai AwardRafi Ahmed Kidwai AwardRafi Ahmed Kidwai Award was instituted by ICAR in 1956 to provide incentives to research workers in India and to recognize their outstanding research work...
, ICAR, India, 2007 - Fellow of the Academy, Indian National Science AcademyIndian National Science AcademyThe Indian National Science Academy , New Delhi is the apex body of Indian scientists representing all branches of science & technology.-History:...
, 2011 - Fellow of the Academy, National Academy of Sciences, IndiaNational Academy of Sciences, IndiaThe National Academy of Sciences, India is the oldest Science Academy in India. It is located in Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh...
, 2011 - Secretary, National Academy of Agricultural Science, 2011
Institution building and infrastructure development
- Creation of Molecular Biology Unit at CFTRI Mysore in 1992 - This lab was created from a grant of Rs. 10 lakhs by the Director CFTRI and is still in functional in the Department of Microbiology at CFTRI. It is used of gene cloning and PCR markers analysis
- Creation of Molecular Markers Lab at GBPUA&T in 1995-96 - This lab has been used for conducting post graduate thesis research by numerous students at GBPUAT, Pantanagar. Also at Pantnagar, a Biolistic Genet Transfer lab was created along with transgenic containment glasshouse with power backup for the development of transgenic wheat. This is being used for creating transgenics in different crops.
- Development of following new laboratories under the rice genome project at NRCPB-IARI, New Delhi
-
- 1. Physical Mapping Lab- for BAC DNA fingerprinting, genetic mapping and BAC filter hybridization
- 2. Cloning Lab- I sused for shotgun cloning of BAC clones. It has also been used extensively for making several cDNA libraries and microsatellite enrichedMicrosatellite enrichmentMicrosatellite enrichment is a method in molecular biology used for enriching the amount of microsatellite sequences in a DNA sample. This can be achieved by designing oligonucleotide probes that hybridize with the repeats in the microsatellites and then pull out the probe/microsatellite complexes...
genomic libraries by scientists from NRCPB and NARS system - 3. DNA sequencing Lab- The lab is being used extensively for genome sequencing and EST sequencing of tomato, pigeonpe and M. ciceri
- 4. Geno-informatics Lab- A high capacity Sun TCF server, six SUN ultra10 servers, a backup DLT tape libreary, FOC broadband connectivity and 15 SUN ray thin clients has been established for genome analysis work and is being extensively used.
- 5. Common Facility Lab- This lab has been created for making MilliQ pure water, autoclaving, shaker, centrifugation etc. and it is being used extensively by all the labs at the NRCPB, even those outside the rice genome area
- 6. Functional Genomics Lab- This lab provides general wet lab facility for DNA extraction, PCR, agarose gel electrophoresis and PAGE.
- Creation of Central Micro Array and Proteomics Facility under the ICAR Network Project on Transgenics in Crops: This lab is already operational with the installation of DHPLC system and Affymatrix Microaray system, analysis of micro array chips of maize, rice and Medicago trucatula has been done in this lab.
- For high throughput genotyping Dr. N.K. Singh has established a Sequenom System for SNP genotyping (First of its kind in any public organization in India) and Robotics System for plant DNA extraction in 96-well format.