Dr M.L. Jat Inaugurates the 6th International Conference on Plant Physiology 2025

15 December 2025, New Delhi

The 6th International Conference on Plant Physiology 2025 (ICPP2025) entitled ‘Translational Genomics & Physiology for Sustainable Agriculture’ organised jointly by Indian Society for Plant Physiology (ISPP) New Delhi and Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, organised at TNAU Coimbatore was inaugurated by Dr M.L. Jat, Secretary (DARE) and Director General (ICAR), today.

Dr. M.L. Jat, appreciated the efforts of ISPP in cultivating the science of Plant Biology in India since 1958, and significant contributions made by plant physiologist. He pointed out that agricultural productivity is the function of interaction of genome with environment and management, and to augment the agricultural productivity, plant physiology, is the the connecting link for both genetic improvement and crop management, and use frontier technologies such AI, genomics and genome editing to meet the Amrit kaal targets. Recalling the demand for 2047, and absolute maximum food production potential of India, Dr Jat urged the plant physiologist to conduct basic and strategic research in the areas including enhancement of genetic gain by 2%, Inhibition of Photorespiration, Conversion of C3 plant to C4 plants, Biological nitrogen fixation by cereals, enhancing water use efficiency in the warming world to minimize the increasing transpirational demand, minimization of nocturnal transpiration, root system architecture and rhizosphere engineering to harness soil water and nutrients  and plant health based precision agriculture.

Prof. Sanjay Kumar, President of Indian Society of Plant Physiology, and Chairperson, ASRB, New Delhi, spoke about the major recent significant advances in the area of plant biology globally, acknowledged the contributions of Indian plant physiologists, and stressed that Indian plant physiologists to integrate Genomic, Phenomics and deep physiological, genomic and phenomic data for predictive breeding to develop climate resilient and resource use efficient crops. Starting from the very fundamental research on development of Rubisco 2.0, the most abundant enzyme on the earth that catalyses the food production from solar energy, in to a faster, CO₂-responsive, and heat-stable enzyme to Precision crop management, plant physiologist must contribute in an inter disciplinary mode. He stressed the need for a global network of 100 Climate-Ready Physiological Observatories to conduct research on understanding and developing future ready crops.

Dr. R. Thamizh Vendan, Acting Vice-Chancellor, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Former Presidents of the ISPP namely Padmasri Prof. Sudhir Sopory, Former Vice Chancellor, JNU, New Delhi, Dr.  Chandrababu, Former Vice Chancellor, KAU, Vice Chancellor, Dr. Crispin Taylor, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB), USA, Prof. M. Raveendran, Director (Research), TNAU, Prof.  M Kalarani, Director, Crop Management, TNAU, Dr. A. Senthil, Organizing Secretary, ICPP- 2025, Dr. V. Chinnusamy, Secretary, ISPP, New Delhi.

The Inaugural function was attended by about 1000 registered delegates including 38 international delegates, invited speakers, Awardees, and students. The conference will be conducted for four days from 15-18 December 2025.

(Source: TNAU Coimbatore & ISPP, New Delhi)