Tariq Aftab received his Ph.D. in the Department of Botany at Aligarh Muslim University, India, and is currently an Assistant Professor there. He is the recipient of a prestigious Leibniz-DAAD fellowship from Germany, Raman Fellowship from the Government of India, and Young Scientist Awards from the State Government of Uttar Pradesh (India) and Government of India. After completing his doctorate, he has worked as Research Fellow at National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources, New Delhi and as Post-doctorate Fellow at Jamia Hamdard, New Delhi, India. Dr. Aftab also worked as Visiting Scientist at Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK), Gatersleben, Germany, and in the Department of Plant Biology, Michigan State University, USA. He is a member of various scientific associations from India and abroad. He has edited 6 books with with international publishers, including Elsevier Inc., Springer Nature and CRC Press (Taylor & Francis Group), co-authored several book chapters, and published over 50 research papers in peer-reviewed international journals. His research interests include physiological, proteomic, and molecular studies on medicinal and aromatic plants.Khalid Rehman Hakeem, PhD is Professor at King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. After completing his doctorate (Botany; specialization in Plant Eco-physiology and Molecular Biology) from Jamia Hamdard, New Delhi, India, in 2011, he worked as a lecturer at the University of Kashmir, Srinagar, for a short period. Later, he joined Universiti Putra Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia, and worked there as Post Doctorate Fellow in 2012 and Fellow Researcher (Associate Prof.) from 2013 to 2016. Dr. Hakeem has more than 10 years of teaching and research experience in plant eco-physiology, biotechnology and molecular biology, medicinal plant research, plant-microbe-soil interactions as well as in environmental studies. He is the recipient of several fellowships at both national and international levels; also, he has served as the visiting scientist at Jinan University, Guangzhou, China. Currently, he is involved with a number of international research projects with different government organizations. So far, Dr. Hakeem has authored and edited more than 50 books with international publishers, including Springer Nature, Academic Press (Elsevier), and CRC Press. He also has to his credit more than 110 research publications in peer-reviewed international journals and 60 book chapters in edited volumes with international publishers. At present, Dr. Hakeem serves as an editorial board member and reviewer of several high-impact international scientific journals from Elsevier, Springer Nature, Taylor and Francis, Cambridge, and John Wiley Publishers. He is included in the advisory board of Cambridge Scholars Publishing, UK. He is also a fellow of Plantae group of the American Society of Plant Biologists, member of the World Academy of Sciences, member of the International Society for Development and Sustainability, Japan, and member of Asian Federation of Biotechnology, Korea. Dr. Hakeem has been listed in Marquis Who’s Who in the World, since 2014–2020. Currently, Dr. Hakeem is engaged in studying the plant processes at eco-physiological as well as molecular levels.
