Dr Tan Boon Chin is an Associate Professor and Director of the Centre for Research in Biotechnology for Agriculture (CEBAR) at the University of Malaya (UM). He obtained his BSc in Biotechnology from Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) and his PhD in Plant Biotechnology from the University of Nottingham. He joined UM as a postdoctoral research fellow before progressing to the position of Senior Lecturer. Dr Tan's interests span plant molecular biology and biochemistry. His current research aims to combine omics and molecular approaches to understand the regulatory mechanisms of transcription factors in environmentally stressed crops, to identify ways to improve crop tolerance for near-future climates. These include (1) developing a product in the form of biostimulants to mitigate climate stress for these crops, (2) developing appropriate educational programmes for farmers to promote sustainable agriculture, and (3) making recommendations to policymakers. Dr Tan's research interests also encompass genetically manipulating biosynthetic pathways in plants to produce beneficial bioactive compounds. Additionally, he explores the potential of using plants as an alternative platform for producing high-value recombinant pharmaceutical proteins. Dr Tan served as the Lead Consultant for the National Biosafety Policy and Action Plan project. He is an Associate Editor of the Journal of Plant Growth Regulation (JPGR) and Annals of Botany (AoB), and serves on the Editorial Boards of BMC Plant Biology, Heliyon, Molecular Biotechnology (MOBI), Asia Pacific Journal of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology (APJMBB), Discover Food, Discover Plants, and the Journal of Agribusiness Marketing (JAMA). Dr Tan is also the President of the Malaysian Society for Molecular Biology and Biotechnology (MSMBB), an Honorary Secretary General of the Asia Oceania Agricultural Proteomics Organization (AOAPO), a council member of the Malaysian Proteomics Society (MAPS), Malaysian Society of Plant Physiology (MSPP), and Malaysian Society of Systems and Synthetic Biology (MyBioSS), and an eLife Community Ambassador.  He received several awards, including the Royal Society-Newton Advanced Fellowship (2017), the Travel Award for the Asia Pacific Biosafety Association Conference from the United States Department of State Biosecurity Engagement Program (2017), and the Alltech Young Scientist Award 2012/13. His research group is committed to applying their expertise and ideas to catalyse efforts to achieve the second Sustainable Development Goal (SDG2). See the interview: https://www.springernature.com/gp/researchers/the-source/blog/blogposts-communicating-research/enhan...

Ts. Dr. Md. Hasanuzaman is a Chartered Engineer, UK; Senior Member IEEE and working as Associate Professor at the UM Power Energy Dedicated Advanced Centre (UMPEDAC), Higher Institution Centre of Excellence (HICoE), Universiti Malaya (UM), Malaysia. He was listed among the World's Top 2% Scientists by Stanford University & Elsevier since 2020 to 2025; World’s Top 17 (2025) & 20 (2024) Highly Ranked Scholars in Energy Conservation by Scholar GPS, USA; Top 3 (2026) & 4 (2025) Scientists in Malaysia (Energy Engineering), Engineering & Technology, AD Scientific Index. He is recipient of AUA Scholars Award 2023-2024, Excellence Bangladeshi Academician Award 2024, Universiti Malaya Excellent Service Awrad 2023, Universiti Malaya Excellent Service Certificate 2021. Dr. Hasan served as the Programme Coordinator Master of Renewable Energy, Double Degree Programme with Master of Energy Science, Kyoto University, Japan from April 2012 to September 2020. He earned his PhD and an M. Eng. Sc. from the University of Malaya (UM), Malaysia and a B. Sc. in Mechanical Engineering from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), Bangladesh. He is a recipient of UM Excellence Award 2012 for his outstanding achievement in his PhD; merit Scholarship from Bangladesh Scholarship Council and Nippon Foundation, Japan in 2003-2004. Dr. Hasan’s research interests include Energy Engineering, Renewable Energy, Energy and Buildings, Energy Policy, Electric Vehicles, Hydrogen Technologies, Hydrogen Vehicles, Sustainability, Carbon Pricing, Carbon Tax and Trade. He is an Associate Editor of the Alexandria Engineering Journal, Elsevier; Guest Editor of Renewable Energy. His 3 books: (1) Advanced Renewable Energy Conversion Technologies and Power Plant Engineering, 2025 (2) Technologies for Solar Thermal Energy, 2022 and (3) Energy for Sustainable Development, 2019 published by Elsevier.

Abdullah GANI is a Professor at the Department of Computer System and Technology, Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, University of Malaya, Malaysia. He obtained tertiary academic qualifications from the University of Hull, UK – B.Phil, and M.Sc (Information Management) and the University of Sheffield, UK for Phd in Computer Science. Prior to his degree studies, he acquired the Teaching Certificate from Kinta Teaching College, Ipoh and Diploma of Computer Science, from ITM. He has vast teaching experience due to having worked in a number of educational institutions locally and abroad – schools, Malay Women Teaching College, Melaka, Ministry of Education; Rotterham College of Technology and Art, Rotterham, UK, University of Sheffield, UK. His interest in research kicked off in 1983 when he was chosen to attend the 3-Month Scientific Research Course in RECSAM by the Ministry of Education, Malaysia. Since then, more than 150 academic papers have been published in proceedings and respectable journals internationally within top 10% ranking. He received a very good number of citation in Web of Science as well as Scopus databases. He actively supervises numerous students at all level of study – Bachelor, Master and Phd. Area of interest in research includes Self-Organized Systems, Machine Learning, Reinforcement Learning, Wireless related networks. He is now working on Mobile Cloud Computing with the High Impact Research Grant of USD 800,000 (RM2.5) for the period of 2011-2016. He is also the Principal Investigator of the research ‘Al-Quran and Hadith Authentication Systems’ with the grant of RM650,000. Besides that, he has received several grants of more than RM350,000. Currently, he is the Director of the Centre for Mobile Cloud Computing Research (C4MCCR at http://mobcc.fsktm.um.edu.my), which focuses on high impact research. The Centre has published more than 60 papers in Tier 1 and Tier 2 ISI-indexed journals in the last 5 years. Internationally, he serves as a Visiting Professor at the King Saud University, Saudi Arabia, Adjuct Professor at the COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Islamabad, Pakistan. Currently, he serves as a reviewer to several high quality journals, and Chief-in-Editor of Malaysian Journal of Computer Science, ISI-indexed journal. Locally, he is a Visiting Professor at the University Malaysia Sabah, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia (2015-2017). He serves as a Chairman of Industry Advisory Panel for Research Degree Program at UNITEN, Malaysia (2015-2017). He is a senior member of IEEE and was elected as a Fellow Academy of Sciences Malaysia (FASc) for Engineering and Computer Science discipline.