Institute of Bioresources and Sustainable Development (IBSD) organized a programme on “Connecting genomics and transcriptomics for the development of bioresources” at Imphal, Manipur. During the event, Prof. Pulok Kumar Mukherjee, Director, IBSD highlighted initiatives of IBSD for developing genomic resources for microbes and medicinal plants of the North Eastern Region. He mentioned that IBSD is working on this context of genomics of bioresources to catalogue the rich and unique microbial diversity and medicinal plants of the region. He highlighted that IBSD has a huge repository of microbial cultures from unique biodiversity niches which can be explored for biomanufacturing and development of bioeconomy.

Dr. Sagar Sengupta, Director, of the National Institute of Biomedical Genomics, Kalyani highlighted the importance of genomics in exploring the biodiversity of NER including microbes and medicinal plants. He also mentioned that IBSD and NIBMG can collaborate for metagenome sequencing and analysis of selected microbes. He assured full support from NIBMG for the training and development of human resources for data analysis. During the event, Prof. Indrajit Dube, Vice Chancellor, of National Law University, Shillong highlighted various areas of collaboration with IBSD for documentation of traditional knowledge and bioresources for sustainable development. He mentioned that legal research must be integrated with bioresource from regulatory perspectives for the development of bioeconomy.

IBSD is the only institute in the ambit of BRIC under the Department of Biotechnology, Govt. of India established in NER which is working on the documentation of bioresources and integrated study for their scientific validation, value addition to propelling innovations, discoveries and inventions for catalysing the growth of the industry in the region for livelihood generation and boosting bioeconomy with different perspectives. IBSD has established the Phytopharmaceutical Mission of the North Eastern Region. Under this programme, IBSD is working on ethnobotany and ethnopharmacological perspectives of medicinal plants including their cultivation, promotion, value addition and chemical profiling, and promotion of start-ups based on the development of herbal medicinal products.

IBSD is exploring microbial resources from different ecological niches of NE India viz., cave ecosystem, forest ecosystem, fermented food, endophytes, hot-spring, cold spring, limestone deposits, high altitude ecosystems and preserved at the microbial repository centre of IBSD, Imphal. This repository is unique with a huge collection of microbes from NER, which can play as a potential lead for not only new drug development but also very effective for the antimicrobial resistance (AMR) study. IBSD is also exploring wild edible mushrooms of NER for nutraceutical potential and AMR study. IBSD has documented a large number of indigenous traditional knowledge associated with traditional fermented foods of NER. IBSD has developed a starter culture consortium and controlled fermentation process for safe, quality, and healthy products.

IBSD is involved in several outreach activities to ensure that the fruits of its research reach the common people of this region. In this context, IBSD is organising many outreach activities for farmers, traditional healers, and women entrepreneurs of NER to promote “Bioeconomy from Bioresources”, programmes for promoting local bioresources among school/ college students of NER.

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