Institute of Bioresources and Sustainable Development (IBSD) celebrated National Technology Day by organizing a seminar on “Bioeconomy from Bioresources: Promoting Bioresources in NER for Viksit Bharat”. During the event, Prof. Pulok Kumar Mukherjee, Director, IBSD delivered the welcome address and highlighted the research and outreach activities performed by the Institute for the promotion of bioresources towards bioeconomy development. He highlighted several unique bioresources which is being explored by IBSD for the development of products/ processes/ technologies. He mentioned that IBSD is working on documentation of bioresources of NER and integrated study for their scientific validation, and value addition to propel innovations, discoveries and inventions for catalysing the growth of industry in the region for livelihood generation and boosting bioeconomy with different perspectives. He highlighted that IBSD has established 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.

The Chief Guest of the programme, Prof. Vinod Kumar Singh, Chair Professor, IIT, Kanpur delivered the keynote address and highlighted various examples of bioresources for identifying novel molecules. He appreciated the research and outreach activities of IBSD for the development of bioeconomy from bioresources.

Dr. G. Taru Sharma, Director, BRIC-National Institute of Animal Biotechnology, Hyderabad highlighted the research activities of NIAB which can be integrated with bioresources of NER for biomanufacturing. She also highlighted many initiatives of the Department of Biotechnology, Govt. of India for the development of human resources in this region.

Prof. Krishnan Baskar, Director, Indian Institute of Information Technology, Manipur highlighted various ideas for integration of artificial intelligence for the development of bioresources of NER for the development of technologies.

Dr. S. Yoirentomba, Deputy Director, MSME, Technology Centre, Imphal, Manipur highlighted the initiative of MSME for entrepreneurship development using local bioresources of NER. He appreciated the outreach activities of IBSD to reach the society and collaborate with other institutes for collaborative research.

The programme was attended by scientists, scholars and staff of IBSD, Imphal and other institutes including centres of IBSD at Sikkim, Shillong and Mizoram.

Among the various scientific interventions of IBSD, it 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 NE India. IBSD has developed a starter culture consortium and controlled fermentation process for safe, quality, and healthy products. IBSD is also working on the development of rapid diagnostic kit for the detection of common fermented food-borne pathogens in locally available fermented foods and products.

IBSD is involved in a number of 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.

IBSD has organized the International Bioresource Conclave to showcase the different bioresources, and local traditional medicines of NER, participated in the G20 event on Research and Innovation Initiative Gathering (RIIG) for “Circular Bio-economy” to highlight the various initiatives for the promotion of bioresources and development of Bioeconomy of NER. All these initiatives have highlighted IBSD as an institute of local relevance and global importance.

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