Natural Product Based Drug Discovery Against Human Parasites: Opportunities and Challenges

Dr. Archana Singh

Dr. Archana Singh, Assistant Professor, Hansraj College, University of Delhi, is a Ph. D. from National Institute of Plant Genome Research, Arunaasaf, Ali Marg, New Delhi. Dr. Singh is a recipient of “Young Scientist fellowship” (2012) and “Early Career Research Award” (2017) from SERB, DST, Government of India; Raman Post-Doctoral fellowship from University Grant Commission and European Molecular Biology Organization fellowship from Heidelberg, Germany.  Dr. Archana has worked as a visiting scientist at Max Planck Institute of Chemical Ecology, Jena, Germany during 2019-20 and at University of Kentucky, Lexington, USA (2016-17). Dr. Archana has been bestowed with Best Researcher Award, 2017 and Best Teacher Award, 2018. Dr. Singh has published many research articles in Journals of National and International repute such as International Journal of Biological Macromolecules, BBA Molecular Basisof Disease, Clinica Chimica Acta, Scientific Reports, Computational Biology and Chemistry, Bioorganic & Medicinal Chemistry, Anti-Cancer Agents in Medicinal Chemistry etc. Dr. Singh has also filed a patent on diagnosis of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Dr. Archana has also edited two books and authored many book chapters published by Springer and Elsevier. Dr. Archana is a life-member/member of IBS, and AIMI. Besides, she has served as a reviewer for several international and national journals and book proposals. Dr. Singh has trained many post-graduate and graduate students, and currently supervises two doctoral and one post-doctoral researchers. Currently, she is working on “Plant Immunity and Human Health” with special emphasis on drug discovery for cancer, tuberculosis, parasitic diseases of human and allergens of plant origin.

Dr. Brijesh Rathi obtained Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from University of Delhi and currently, working as Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Hansraj College University Enclave, University of Delhi, India. He is recipient of the prestigious “young scientist fellowship” (2010), “early career research award” (2016) from DST, Government of India, CAPES-Print Fellowship (2019) from Ministry of Education Brazil, and the prestigious “Excellence Awards for In Service Teachers” (2018) by University of Delhi. Dr. Rathi has been Visiting Assistant Professor (2016–2017) at Department of Chemistry, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, USA, and now Affiliate Faculty at University of Loyola Chicago and University of Debrecen, Hungary. He has published more than 60 papers in various journals of National and International repute. Dr. Rathi holds the position of section editor for Current Topics in Medicinal Chemistry, and associate editor membership of Chemical Biology Letters. Dr. Rathi has supervised five undergraduate research students in the past, and currently supervising various doctoral students and one master thesis. His main research interests are centered at the development of new antiparasitic and antiviral agents and their target identification.

Dr. Anita Kamra Verma, is Professor of Zoology has over 32 years of teaching and research experience at Kirori Mal College, University of Delhi, Delhi, India. She has done Post -Doctoral research at National Institute of Immunology, New Delhi. (1994-1998), and worked as a Senior Scientist at the School of Pharmacy, University of Manchester (1998-2000). Her research interests include identifying predictive biomarkers and using plant products as immunomodulators to mitigate cancer, arthritis and osteoporosis, exploiting nanotherapeutics  for human health and disease, making in-vivo models for quantifying nanoparticlulate drug delivery for cancer, diabetes and arthritis, developing rationale designs based on whole body and cellular pharmacokinetics-pharmaco-dynamic profile of drugs. She has two Patents on Anti-Cancer Drugs and over 125 publications in peer reviewed international journals of repute and 12 book chapters to her credit. She has been conferred with various prestigious awards notably the Distinguished Collaborator Award, 2019, from UClan, UK, Best Researcher Award, 2018 and Best Teacher Award, 2017, Best paper award from ‘Rapid Prototyping Journal’ in 2016 and Charles Darwin Gold medal in 2009. Dr Verma is a member of many National and International scientific societies and organizations importantly, AAPS PharmSciTech, Nanotechnology, BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine, Pharmaceutical Research, International Journal of Pharmaceutics; Bioscience Reports, International Research Journal of Biotechnology, Nanoscience & Nanotechnology in Biology and Medicine, Journal of Biomaterials and Nanobiotechnology. Dr. Verma has been a member of the selection committee for the prestigious Khorana Scholar program partnered byDepartment of Biotechnology (DBT), Govt. of India, Indo-U.S. Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF) and WINStep Forward for 4 years. Dr. Verma has supervised 14 PhD students and is currently supervising six doctoral and two post-doctoral students.

Dr. Indrakant K. Singh received his Ph.D. in Zoology from the Department of Zoology, University of Delhi (DU). Dr. Singh is currently working as Professor (Zoology), Deshbandhu College, & Fellow, Delhi School of Public Health, Institute of Eminence, University of Delhi, New Delhi, where he enjoys teaching, Immunology, Genomics, Computation Biology, and Medical Diagnostics. He is a recipient of the Young Scientist Award/Fellowship (2013-2016) by Science & Engineering Research Board (SERB), Raman-Post Doctoral Fellowship (2016-17), Max-Planck Society Visiting Post-Doctoral Fellowship (2019) and ICMR-DHR Long Term International Fellowship for Young Bio-medical Scientists (2019-20 & 2022-23), Prestigious Delhi University Excellence Award for Teacher in Service 2021 and DHR Long Term Fellowship for Training in Indian Institute (2022). He has also been awarded with Best Researcher, 2017 and Best Teacher, 2018 by Grace India Trust India. Dr. Singh also filed two (2) patents (India & USA) on Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Prof. Singh is a life-member/Fellow/member of many prestigious academic societies including the RSB, AMCA, IBS, and AIMI, ESI, BSI. Dr. Singh has published more than 50 quality research articles in peer-reviewed journals of international repute like Scientific Reports, International Journal of Biological Macromolecules, Critical Reviews in Biotechnology, Clinica Chimica Acta, International Journal of Molecular Sciences and BBA Molecular Basis of Disease, Computational Biology and Chemistry, Phytochemistry, Anti-Cancer Agents in Medicinal Chemistry. He is an editorial board member in many international and national journals like Scientific Reports-SpringerNature etc. He has also edited four books and authored more than 30 book chapters published by Springer, Taylor & Francis and Elsevier. Dr. Singh has served as a reviewer for several international and national refereed journals. Dr. Singh has trained many post-doctoral, doctoral, post-graduate and graduate students, and currently supervises five doctoral and two post-doctoral, fore M.Tech. students. Over the years, he has pursued his research interests in the areas of Molecular biology, Cancer Biology, and Functional Genomics.