Syed Shams Yazdani is Group Leader of the Microbial Engineering, Integrative Biology group and Coordinator of DBT-ICGEB Centre for Advanced Bioenergy Research at the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology in New Delhi, India. His research Interests are in metabolic engineering, cellulolytic enzymes, and biofuels. He holds a BSc (Hons) Chemistry from Aligarh Muslim University and MSc and PhD (Biotechnology) from Jawaharlal Nehru University. His group is currently involved in development of technologies for fungal enzymes, C5/C6 sugar fermentation and advanced biofuels production, such as butanol, fatty alcohols and alkanes.
His early career research led to the development of technologies for production of recombinant streptokinase and recombinant malaria vaccine candidates, which were transferred to industries for cGMP production, clinical trials and commercialization. He was further involved in a breakthrough discovery during his research at Rice University, Houston, USA as an overseas fellow, where a novel pathway was identified in E. coli to produce bioethanol from glycerin, a waste from biodiesel industry. He is an author of >50 publications in high impact international journals and 15 patent applications. He leads several multilateral international collaborative projects, including Indo-UK, Indo-Australia and Indo-US. He is a member of editorial board of Journal of Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology (JIMB), Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology and Indian Journal of Biotechnology, and reviewers of many renowned peer review journals. He serves in various committees of Government of India such as Department of Biotechnology (DBT), Department of Science and Technology (DST), Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) and many academic institutions. He is representing India in an AHTEG of Synthetic Biology at UN Convention of Biological Diversity.