Balasore: Proud moment for this northeastern district, as scientist Siddhartha Pati of Balasore has been chosen for the prestigious Biju Patnaik Wildlife Conservation Award 2024 by the state Forest, Environment and Climate Change department for his significant contribution to conservation of horseshoe crabs. Pati and Shailendra Narayan Satpathy of Bolangir will jointly receive the award at a grand event to be held by the state government marking the Wildlife Week in Bhubaneswar in the first week of October, according to sources.
Pati has led several internationally funded horseshoe crab conservation projects as principal investigator, receiving support from Rufford Foundation UK, Bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund UAE, Conservation Leadership Programme UK, WWF India and Idea Wild USA. He has produced the world’s first silent clay art film, “A Day for Living Fossil”, to raise awareness about the biomedical and ecological importance of horseshoe crabs. He was a desktop reviewer for International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Heritage Nominations in 2020. As the founder of the Association for Biodiversity Conservation and Research (ABC), he actively works for the conservation of horseshoe crabs and other marine species. He has been leading efforts to raise awareness of the biomedical and ecological importance of living fossil since 2012. Pati and his team at the ABC in Balasore have explored various horseshoe crab conservation strategies, such as assisting IUCN with updating the species’ status and promoting awareness among local communities. Pati is also a specialist in IUCN Species Survival Commission. He completed his M Sc in Biotechnology from Fakir Mohan University and earned his PhD (Doctorate in Science) from the same university in 2019 with a fellowship from the Board of Research in Nuclear Sciences (BRNS), Department of Atomic Energy. He pursued his postdoctoral research at University of Malaysia Terengganu, Malaysia. Pati has worked with national and international institutes like FM University, Khallikote University, AMIT Bhubaneswar, University Malaysia Terengganu and Udayana University, Indonesia. His research integrates his passion for science and hiking with applied research and innovation in bioprospecting. He has been invited as a visiting researcher to Chinese University of Hong Kong and National University Singapore.
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Several national and international journals have published more than 70 of his papers. He has also contributed popular articles to various magazines and edited three books on applied science, widely read by life science scholars and professionals. He has filed a patent for his innovation too. Pati has presented scientific papers at international conferences in Japan, Thailand, Indonesia, China and Singapore, and serves as an editor and reviewer for several academic journals. He is also an advisory member for institutions like KKS College, Balasore, and the University of Engineering & Management, Kolkata. He has received several awards including Future Conservationist Award (2018) from the Conservation Leadership Programme, Cambridge, UK.
In 2023, Pati was honoured with the prestigious UNISERF Award by Udayana University, Indonesia. Currently, he is working as a scientist-cum-director at NatNov Bioscience, where he applies his research to develop agricultural biostimulants from crustacean shells using biotechnological methods with a zero-waste mindset, reducing carbon footprint and providing employment to over 30 people in the startup unit. After the announcement of his award, wildlife scientists, researchers, conservationists and various institutions from all over India and across the world congratulated him.
