MICROBIAL TECHNOLOGY

Microbial technology in human welfare; Isolation and screening of microbes important for industry – advances in methodology and its application; Advanced genome and epigenome editing tools (e.g., engineered zinc finger proteins, TALEs/TALENs, and the CRISPR/Cas9 system as nucleases for genome editing, transcription factors for epigenome editing, and other emerging tools) for manipulation of useful microbes/strains and their applications; Strain improvement to increase yield of selected molecules, e.g., antibiotics, enzymes, biofuels.

Environmental application of microbes; Ore leaching; Biodegradation - biomass recycle and removal; Bioremediation - toxic waste removal and soil remediation; Global Biogeochemical cycles; Environment sensing (sensor organisms/ biological sensors); International and National guidelines regarding use of genetically modified organisms in environment, food and pharmaceuticals.

Recombinant protein and pharmaceuticals production in microbes – common bottlenecks and issues (technical/operational, commercial and ethical); Attributes required in industrial microbes (Streptomyces sp., Yeast) to be used as efficient cloning and expression hosts (biologicals production); Generating diversity and introduction of desirable properties in industrially important microbes (Streptomyces/Yeast); Microbial cell factories; Downstream processing approaches used in industrial production process (Streptomyces sp., Yeast).

Application of microbes and microbial processes in food and healthcare industries - food processing and food preservation, antibiotics and enzymes production, microbes in targeted delivery application – drugs and vaccines (bacterial and viral vectors); Non-recombinant ways of introducing desirable properties in Generally recognized as safe (GRAS) microbes to be used in food (e.g., Yeast) - exploiting the existing natural diversity or the artificially introduced diversity through conventional acceptable techniques (mutagenesis, protoplast fusion, breeding, genome shuffling, directed evolution etc.).

Microbial genomics for discovery of novel enzymes, drugs/ antibiotics; Limits of microbial genomics with respect to use in human welfare; Metagenomics and metatranscriptomics – their potential, methods to study and applications/use (animal and plant health, environmental clean-up, global nutrient cycles & global sustainability, understanding evolution), Global metagenomics initiative - surveys/projects and outcome, metagenomic library construction and functional screening in suitable hosts – tools and techniques for discovery/identification of novel enzymes, drugs (e.g., protease, antibiotic) etc.