Probiotics and Their Role in Improving Human Health

Renu Agrawal is the Ex. Chief Scientist at CSIR-CFTRI, Mysuru, India and Rural Program Coordinator for outreach activities at CFTRI. She has over 20 patents to her name, with 67+ publications in International and National Journals. She has presented more than 160 papers in various national and international conferences and delivered more than 700 talks. She has guided students for M.Sc, M. Phil and PhD in Biotechnology and Microbiology. She has represented India as a team leader taking scientific delegation for the Asia meet at Indonesia, Bali nominated by DST, Government of India. She had her PhD from University of Rajasthan, Jaipur. Her areas of specialization include Biotransformation and Probiotics. Her research involves lactic acid bacteria, yeasts and Bacillus as probiotic properties inhibiting harmful diseases and reduce the use of antibiotics improving health in the society. Her group has developed greener probiotic technologies used by the common man. As CSIR-800 Rural Program coordinator she led CSIR-CFTRI for CSIR 800 to give a better quality of life to 800 million people in India through scientific and technological intervention. Many awareness camps, demonstrations of technologies were dissipated around the country. She has been passionate about farmers and has organized many national level conferences for all India farmers and for women farmers. She has also been proactive to show them alternate cropping with high nutrient crops. The microbial processes of her team on Ready to make idli and dosa batter are the most downloaded processes from CFTRI.She has been awarded at multiple scientific associations. Some honourable mentions are Scientific fellow awards as FAMI,FNABS,FSAB,FISBT. She has been awarded Karamveer Chakra by REX-UN both bronze and silver, Best woman scientist NABS, Woman achiever from International Guild of woman achievers, Reflections Excellence Award from All India Association of Rotary Inner wheel, Kissan Ratna Puraskar from JCI International, Abdul Kalam Lifetime Achievement Award, Nari Shakti Award from Random Kindness and the Ministry of Women and Child development and Bharat Shiksha Gaurav Puraskar to name a few. She has been selected as the 'Best Woman Scientist' by National Academy of biological sciences, felicitated by Rotary Inner wheel for scientific excellence with 'Suguna Award' and felicitated at various scientific and societal forums. In Rotary Innerwheel she was awarded the Best secretary for two times and also Best ISO twice in the district 3180. She is the editor of seven and reviewer for sixteen research Journals and has authored scientific books for the welfare and good health of the community. Her books include "Role of Probiotics in improving human health", "Utilization of agricultural wastes to high valued products", "Making Food safe free from pathogens" and "Traditional Foods and Nutritional Security". The books are being published by CRC publications, UK and NIPA, India. She has written many book chapters with Marcell Dekkar, USA and Taylor and Francis, UK. Her work has won many best paper awards at the national and international conferences. She has taught as faculty of M.Sc Food Technology at CFTRI and as Professor to ACSIR students. She has served as the president of 'Association of Microbiologists of India' and treasurer in "Society of Biological Chemists", Mysore chapter. She has served on the board of many International Technical Advisory committees at Dubai, Bulgaria, Argentina and Indonesia. She has been on the National committees of NCERT of national Science Talent Search, both for moderating the papers and selection of meritorious children for scholarship under NCERT. She has been on the scientist selection boards of UPSC, DST and DBT and many International technical committees. She is an Executive committee board member of 'National Academy of Biological Sciences'. She has been nominated as a National Experts Advisory Committee (NEAC) member from Government of India on; Scheme for Young Scientists and Technologists (SYST), National children science congress, Ministry of science and Technology; member in TIASN (technological intervention for addressing societal need),ASAR, CODER, projects to be taken in cold and Desert areas, Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyay Gram Sankal Pariyojna, AWSAR for augmenting writing skills and'KIRAN' which involves projects for women all from the Department of Science and Technology, Govt. of India. She has been invited by DST and Vigyan Prasar for a lead talk on "Emerging Technologies with nutrition" under Atma Nirbhar Bharat - science, society setu. She has been nominated to the Consultative Group made by the Principal Scientific Advisor, Dr. Vijay Raghavan, cabinet rank,who reports to the prime minister of India for inputs on science and technological developments in the country. She has been appointed as a committee member of evaluators by DST on Smart village in Karnataka and is a committee member with Karnataka government for Sustainable Development Goals. She has been nominated in the expert committee of Bangalore Chambers of Commerce and Industries. She is an expert in the committee on export and guidelines of vegan foods by APEDA, ministry of commerce and Industry, Government of India.She writes for City Today newspaper and Biostand Ups a science magazine. Her views on women empowerment have been relayed on All India Radio on womens day both at the state and national radio. She has been an excellent speaker on "Gender sensitization" organized by DST, Govt of India, Mysuru University and various colleges. She has been honoured as 'SHERO' by Biostandups and Biosetup both online science magazines and is on their editorial board. She an advisor to the International journal IJBST, a publon publication. Dr. Renu has been leading innovations and change in organisations. Her programs and scientific interviews are telecasted on Doordarshan (DD science). She is also involved in the upliftment of rural education of Karnataka through 'Pratham' for teachers training workshops and in translating course material to be made into short videos for the children which is helping them to learn science as fun. She has been a family counsellor at Police helpline, Mysore for last twenty two years and has saved many lives across various age groups. She has served as a Jury member for the selection of I- woman global awards under science and innovation.Currently she is a science communicator, reviewer, author, visiting professor in many universities and colleges and a National Expert Advisor in many committees with the Ministry of Science and Technology and has been imparting training to KAS and KPS officers for Sustainable Development Goals, in Karnataka. She has written the nutritional policy for Government of Karnataka on Food and Nutrition. Her commitment to work can be seen as she was taken as Project Advisor by CFTRI even after her retirement. She has been serving the society with her work. She has served as the secretary of "CSIR Pensioners Welfare Association, Mysuru centre, after her retirement and organized a national level conference on "Health and Wellness". She is a philanthropist and has been running many fellowships, national level competitions for poor meritorious students, novel writing competitions, constructed a pre fixed auto stand in Mysore for public use, donated serum analyser for rapid detection of HIV and also Paediatric HIV Kits to Asha Kirana hospital at Mysuru.