The major thrust Area of Research in this Department is on Applied Microbiology. We emphasize on Research in Sustainable Environmental Practices. All the Faculty Members are involved in research in this dept. Apart from Research Fundings for Equipment and Infrastructures, supplied from outside agencies, e.g., DBT BOOST II (2015), UGC MRP (2017-2019), and CPE II (2018), honorary collaborations with other Institutes and Universities are also going on.

Research is carried out at two levels, in the Department of Microbiology:

1. The post graduate students are required as part of their curriculum, to work in Summer Projects of two months duration in the 3rd semester and present the results in the same  semester.  All the Faculty members are involved in the Summer Project Works as mentors.
2. Two Faculty members are engaged in research as research guides and  seven scholars are currently working in the department and one in Tripura University, for their Ph.D. degrees.

1. DR. APARNA SEN:

1. Six research scholars are working in this department for their Ph.D. degrees, under the guidance of Dr. Aparna Sen, Associate Professor and Head of this dept. in the fields of Environmental,  Agricultural and Medical Microbiology. Five of them are registered in Department of Biochemistry, University of Calcutta.  One is waiting to be registered in Department of Microbiology, Calcutta University.
2. One research Scholar is working and registered  at Department of Microbiology, University of Tripura,  where  Dr, Aparna Sen is acting as Co-guide.

Studies in the  following  different  areas of Environmental, Agriculture and Medical Microbiology are being pursued  by the above mentioned seven Research  Scholars.

1. Use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides is causing immense environmental and health hazards, globally. Consumption of food crops produced with the use of chemical fertilizers and chemical pesticides are producing profound short and long term medical conditions throughout the world. Sustainable environmental practice is very much essential in addressing the problem of health hazards and risks.  Since, use of chemical fertilizers pose different side effects like soil erosion, depletion of nutrients from soil biota, emphasis has been focused on the use of biofertilizers and biopesticides for safe strains isolated from soil, which symbiotically or nonsymbiotically fixes nitrogen from the atmosphere and make it available to the plants. There are microbes which can also solubilize otherwise insoluble P from the soil and supply it to the plants for their necessary nutrition.  Research on production of a potent biofertilizer is being undertaken and we hope to develop in future, a multitasking biofertilizer which not only could fix atmospheric nitrogen and solubilize inorganic phosphate in soil but also has salt tolerant properties so that it could enable the farmers of the saline tract to produce healthy food crops, despite the high salinity of the soil in the coastal saline areas of Bay of Bengal.
2. Development of intervention strategies against human pathogens by assessing the antibiofilm potential of some active compounds like triterpenoids found in natural products like commonly used traditional Indian herbs and spices, is a way of controlling widespread pathogenicity. We It has been proposed to study the intervention potential of Triterpenoids on the bacterial biofilm.
3. An insoluble fibrous protein, keratin, found in hair, wool, feather and other epithelial coverings, considered as a potent environmental pollutant, is hydrolyzed only by keratinase, an efficient inducible extracellular protease secreted from microbes. This study will be focused on purification and characterization of keratinase secreted from potent bacterial strains isolated from feather dumping soil sites.
4. Studies on the biodegradation of plastics (Low Density Polyethylene or LDPE) will also be carried out in order to overcome the environmental problems associated with synthetic plastic wastes. Therefore, studies on characterization of keratolytic and plastic-degrading microbes will be undertaken with the aim to develop some potent multitasking microbial species of industrial as well as environmental importance.
5. The need for novel chemical compounds to treat human diseases is ever increasing. The rapid development of drug-resistant microbes, the discovery of new cases of life-threatening infections and the constant recurrence of diseases have pushed for advances in the field of drug discovery. Most effective approaches for discovering new pharmacologically significant compounds are by isolating bioactive compounds from biological sources. The study is focused to explore isolation of bioactive compounds like antimicrobial peptides from soil and marine microbiota, assessing their different medicinal applications, especially anticancer activity.
6. The majority (60-70%) of the world tropical and subtropical coastlines are covered with mangrove ecosystems. Mangroves are known to be highly productive ecosystems and have immense ecological values. They protect and stabilize the coastal zones, nourish and nurture the coastal water with nutrients. They play important role as the feeding and breeding areas of many organisms including plants, animals and microorganisms. The microbial community in the mangrove sediment is strongly influenced by bio-geographical, anthropological and ecological properties. These properties include food web in the ecosystem, nutrient cycling and the presence of organic and inorganic matters. Both the sediment and soil probably represent some of the most complex microbial habitats on the Earth. To study the genetic diversity and to analyse the members of mixed microbial populations are the two most important steps in microbial community studies. However, little research has been done on microbial diversity in marine sediments, and little information is currently available. During the past decade, the development of molecular techniques using nucleic acids has led to many new findings in the studies of microbial ecology. As a basic approach to clarify the microbial communities, 16S rRNA genes are amplified by PCR from nucleic acids extracted from environmental samples, and then the PCR products are cloned and sequenced. This approach can avoid the limitation of the traditional culturing techniques for assessing the microbial diversity in the natural environments. Mangrove ecosystems are in general nutrient-deficient, especially of nitrogen and phosphorus. In spite of this, mangroves are highly productive. Microbial activity is responsible for major nutrient transformations within mangrove ecosystem. Sundarbans is world’s largest coastal wetland comprising of mangrove forest which covers about one million hectares in the delta of the rivers Ganga, Brahmaputra, and Meghna. This mangrove region is shared between Bangladesh (~ 60%) and India (~ 40%). The biodiversity of Sundarbans includes numerous species of phytoplankton, zooplankton, microorganisms, benthic invertebrates, mollusks, amphibians and mammals. Little work has been carried out on the microbial diversity in the Sundarbans sediments. Therefore, we propose to study the culture independent microbial diversity analysis of the sediment samples from the famous islands of Sundarbans. Since, Molecular phylogenetic analysis and microbial community structure analysis can provide a better understanding about the microbial population and their interactions in a defined geographical region and such data are important with respect to our understanding of mangrove ecosystem processes and the role of microorganisms in maintaining these processes, the present project will considerably extend our understanding on microbial diversity in Sundarbans sediments.

LIST OF SCHOLARS REGISTERED UNDER GUIDANCE OF DR. APARNA SEN:

2. DR. SOMA PAL SAHA:

1. Microbial synthesis of polyhydroxybutyric acid and other co-polymers polyhydroxy alkanoic acids and their physic-chemical characterization.
2. Biosynthesis of homopolymer and co-polymer by Azotobacter chrococcum MAL-201.
3. Synthesis of polyhydroxy alkanoate-polyethylene glycol co-polymer by A. chrococcum MAL-201.
4. Biosynthesis of extracellular polysaccharides by nitrogen fixing bacteria.
5. Biodegradation PHA polymers in vivi and in vitro.
6. Nitrogen fixation and phosphate solubilisation by ant nest bacteria from Darjeeling, Himalaya.
7. Evaluation of ant nest microorganisms as biofertilisers.

3. DR. MAHUYA MUKHOPADHAY:

One research scholar is working under the guidance of Dr. Mahuya Mukhopadhyay, for her Ph.D. degree.

A variety of microorganisms, mainly bacteria and fungi, inhabit plants and are therefore, known as endophytes. Plant-associated microorganisms have been found to produce novel bioactive metabolites with wide-ranging medicinal applications such as antibiotics, immunosuppressants, antiparasitics, and anticancer agents. Moreover, these microorganisms play an important role in the plant defense mechanism. Antagonistic bacteria provide an environmentally sound alternative to protect plants against attack by fungal pathogens.

It has been proposed to isolate and characterize the endophytes from medicinal plants and explore their potential for antimicrobial production against human pathogens as well as plant pathogens.

Scholar Information of Dr. Mahuya Mukhopadhyay:

4. DR. SOUMI GUHA POLLEY:

Microbial enzymes play a crucial role as metabolic biocatalysts and are being used in different types of industry. ;Nature provides a vast amount of microbial enzyme resources. One of the key areas of search for new enzymes is exploitation of different environmental niches. Studies are focused to emphasize mainly on:

a) production of biodiesel which is a biocatalytic transesterification of lipid feedstock to methyl esters by lipases.

b) amylases which catalyze the hydrolysis of starch into simpler sugar like glucose and perform essential roles in digestion and extensively used in starch processing industries like bakery, textile, paper and brewery. Biotechnology has further broadened its use in pharmaceutical and medicinal chemistry.

c) cellulose which degrades cellulose, the most abundant biopolymer in nature found in the cell wall of plant and acts as a carbon source for the microorganisms responsible for the decomposition of organic matter in soil. Different soil samples from extreme environments shall be screened for amylase, lipase, and cellulase producers. Environment within earthworm gut will also be screened for cellulose degrading bacteria. Strain improvement will be done by using recombinant DNA technology.

5 . DR. MADHULIKA GUPTA:

The textile dyeing industry, responsible for dyeing various types of fiber, stands out among all the industries causing high pollution. The dyes are stable and difficult to be degraded due to their synthetic origin and complex aromatic molecular structures. Presence of Sulphur, naphthol, vat dyes, nitrate, acetic acid, soaps, enzymes and heavy metals like copper, arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury, nickel, cobalt, chromium etc. make the textile effluent highly toxic. It is therefore essential to remove these pollutants from wastewaters before their final disposal. Cyanobacteria being widely distributed in the environment may serve as an effective and economic alternative for removing dyes from textile industry effluents. The capacity of freshwater filamentous Cyanobacteria to decolorize the textile dye and effluent under varied conditions could be studied suggesting the possibility of their application in bioremediation studies.

6. SUDIPTA PAUL BHATTACHARYA:

She is pursuing her Ph.D. research under the guidance of Dr. Aparna Sen, Head, Department of Microbiology. Her area of research is Development of intervention strategies against human pathogens by assessing the antibiofilm potential of some active compounds like triterpenoids found in natural products like commonly used traditional Indian herbs and spices, is a way of controlling widespread pathogenicity. It has been proposed to study the intervention potential of Triterpenoids on the bacterial biofilm.

BACKGROUND ON ADVANCED RESEARCH CENTRE, DEPARTMENT OF MICROBIOLOGY:

Department of Microbiology of Lady Brabourne College has begun its journey from 2002 with introduction of Undergraduate Honors Course in the college. The Post Graduate Curriculum in Microbiology has been introduced in 2005, with 15 seats which has increased to 25 seats in 2016. The PG Course follows the Calcutta University Syllabus. Both the Undergraduate and Post graduate Departments started with minimum infrastructural facilities. It has flourished with great accolade and grandeur acquiring many sophisticated instruments and equipment by obtaining grants from DST FIST and CPE I in 2010 and CPE II in2018, and DBT STAR in 2012 and 2017, respectively. Our Department has been recommended as Star Department by CPE. The Post Graduate Department has also received a grant from West Bengal DBT BOOST II in 2015, under Department of Higher Education, Science Technology Biotechnology, Govt. of West Bengal. The CBCS system has been introduced in both UG and PG curriculums, from the session 2018-2019.

The Post Graduate Department of Microbiology has got the approval from University of Calcutta to establish an advanced Research Center in 2015, along with five other Post Graduate Departments of this college. It has been named ‘Advanced Research Center for Applied Biochemistry and Microbiology’. Research being an integral part of teaching, the Advanced Research Center encourages not only quality research, but it constantly organizes Workshops, Seminars and Faculty Improvement Programmes in order to upgrade the students, research scholars and teachers of the department. Regular monthly seminars and workshops are constantly organosulfur PG students and they are constantly encouraged to attend conferences and workshops outside the college, in other colleges and Research Institutes and present their project works in the form of papers or posters.