Plant Biotechnology & Agriculture

S Leelavathi has completed her PhD in Anther Cultures of different Brassica spp. and has equal expertise in rice anther culture and haploid generation at Bose Institute, Kolkata, India. At ICGEB, New Delhi, she is focusing on chloroplast transformation and expression of foreign genes including several cellulolytic enzymes, which resulted in several original papers and patents. She is also specialized in nuclear transformation techniques of different plants including rice, cotton, tomato, lentil, etc. Her research in cotton regeneration using metabolic stress and transformation using embryogenic callus as explants for Agrobacterium-mediated transformation is an important landmark not only in cotton biotechnology, but other crops as well. Presently, she is interested in use of plant produced cellulolytic enzymes in biofuel research and submergence tolerance in rice and transformation in pulses.