Antibiotics, which played a huge role in combating the Covid-19 virus that killed more than 5.3 lakh people in India, should be viewed as a kind of national security, an expert in the field of biotechnology said on Monday.

There was a need for development in this field for which the cooperation of the society at large was needed, Prof. N. Tajuddin, Pro-Vice Chancellor of B.S. Abdur Rehman Crescent Institute of Science and Technology, a Deemed to be University at Chennai, said while addressing the inaugural program of the two-day national seminar on ‘Research and Innovations in Industrial and Marine Biotechnology: A Circular Economy’ at the Siksha ‘O’ Anusandhan (SOA) here.

Pointing out that environmental pollution and malnutrition had emerged as huge problems for the world, Prof. Tajuddin said biotechnology had a huge role to play in mitigating these problems.

Sponsored by the Department of Science and Technology’s Science and Engineering Research Board (DST-SERB), the seminar is being organised by SOA’s Centre for Industrial Biotechnology Research (CIBR) in collaboration with National Research Development Corporation (NRDC) and Biotechnology Research Society of India (BRSI), Thiruvananthapuram.

The seminar, being attended by researchers, industry experts and policy makers, aimed to foster discussions on innovative biotechnological solutions which align with circular economy principles. “The subject of the seminar is very important in the present scenario as industrial and marine biotechnology are poised to play critical roles in addressing contemporary global challenges such as resource scarcity, environmental degradation and climate change,” Prof. Hrudaynath Thatoi, Director of CIBR, said.

Addressing the program, Prof. Pravat Kumar Roul, Vice-Chancellor of Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology (OUAT), said that biotechnology was the tool which could help in development of agriculture. “Biotechnology is the future of technology,” he said adding there were 6000 start ups, 760 companies and 800 products in the field of biotechnology.

Prof. Pradipta Kumar Nanda, Vice-Chancellor of SOA, who presided over the session, said SOA was focusing on biotechnology and was in the process of organising an international conference on the subject in November next year.

SOA had been laying a lot of thrust on research and had set up 19 research centres including CIBR till now, he said.

The program was also addressed by Dr. Anindita Chakraborty, Scientist, UGC-DAE CSR, Kolkata Center who opined that science had no existence without biotechnology.

Dr. Sibani Mohapatra and Dr. Amrita Banerjee also addressed the program which was conducted by Dr. Sasmita Mohanty.