Dr M.K. Rai is Professor and Head of the Department of Biotechnology at Amravati University in Maharashtra, India. He has published 150 research papers, more than  100 popular articles and  seven books in India and abroad. He is a member of several Scientific Societies and has been a National Scholar for Five years. He has received several prestigious awards, including the father T.A. Mathias award (1989) from the All India Association for Christian Higher Education, and the Medini award (1999) from the Department of Environment and Forest, Government of India. He  also received SERC visiting fellowship by Department of Science and Technology (1996), INSA visiting fellowship by Indian National Science Academy (1998) and TWAS-UNESCO Associateship (2002), Italy. He has approximately two decades of teaching and research experience.