The Department of Botany imparts education in Botany that deals with all aspects of plant life, from the molecules to the biomes. The Department, guided by a highly experienced and committed teaching faculty, offers Bachelors with honours in Botany. It has well-equipped state-of-the-art laboratories with good instrumentation facility.
Teacher In-Charge : Dr. Rajender Kumar
Department Coordinators: Dr. Dharmendra Mallick
DBT Star Advisory Committee Member: Dr. Roshni Rajamohan Mathur
Role of rhizospheric microbiome in stress tolerance of crop plants
Mentor/PI: Dr. Rubina Chongtham, Dr. Madhu Rani and Dr. Dharmendra Kumar Mallick
Number of students: Five
Project status: On-going
Description : The project is designed to identify the susceptible and tolerant plant varieties and identification of associated microbes to assess their roles in stress tolerance. The scientific relevance of this study is immense as the role of soil microbiome in stress tolerance is proposed to be instrumental in sustainable crop protection in view of the eminent global climate crisis. The major research outcome of this project will be to attain a preliminary identification of different microbial component of the rhizosphere of the plants.
Seed dormancy in some medicinally/economically important plants: causes and methods to overcome
Mentor/PI: Dr. Rajender Kumar and Dr. Anju Chhibber
Number of students: Seven
Project status: On-going
Description : The project is designed to study the germination behavior, type of dormancy, causes and their removal methods. The later will be helpful for the propagation, cultivation and conservation of the species concerned.
Floristic study of Deshbandhu College, with special reference to indigenous plants of medicinal importance.
Mentor/PI: Dr. Roshni Rajamohan Mathur, Dr. Madhu Rani, Dr. Rubina Chongtham and Ms. Anjana Singh
Number of students: Thirteen
Project status: On-going
Description : The study will provide an inventory of the flowering plants of the study region which including trees, shrubs and herbs. The inventory will be helpful in developing a checklist of plants of medicinal importance of the area. Diversity of plants of a region is an indicator of the richness of biodiversity of its insect pollinators as well. The outcome of the project can be of use in updating the flora at the district and state level. The students involved in the project will learn about the importance and methodologies involved in floristic studies- plant collection, herbarium techniques, cataloguing etc.
Analysis of rhizosphere from different herbaceous plants for beneficial microbes which can be used as biofertilizers.
Mentor/PI: Dr. Bela Bhatia, Dr. Aparna Nautiyal, Dr. Anju Chhibbar and Dr. Neha Yadav
Number of students: Six
Project status: On-going
Description : The project aims at screening of wild herbaceous plants in the college campus for the diversity of different type of bacteria, and microbial flora including fungi showing association with the roots of higher plants in form of either chlamydospores or nodule forming bacteria, cyanobacteria or mycorrhizal associations. Screening of such wild herbaceous plants that promote AMF technology, will help us to judiciously grow only those plants which are beneficial for maintaining the diversity in the vicinity. This will further provide information regarding the diversity of useful microbial symbiotic associations in rhizosphere of different flowering plants.
Assessment of Air Pollution Tolerance Index (APTI) and Anticipated Performance Index (API) in the avenue trees growing inside the Deshbandhu College Campus
Mentor/PI: Dr. Dharmendra K. Mallick, Dr. Aparna Nautiyal and Ms. Anjana Singh
Number of students: Six
Project status: On-going
Description : Urban air contamination is a serious problem in both developed and developing countries, Delhi, being the capital of India, has been facing many air pollution related problems and has also been ranked one of the ten most polluted cities in the world. Regular checking of the tolerance of the existing tree species to combat pollution and plantations of such more tolerant tree species will have a marked effect on various aspects of the air quality and cleanliness of life in a city. Different plants can respond differently to various types of pollutants, they could be either sensitive or tolerant in nature. In order to understand the effect of air pollution on plants and the adaptation mechanisms of plants under stress conditions, present study is based on the assessment of APTI (Air Pollution Tolerance Index) on few commonly occurring avenue trees of college campus.
To study the physiological roles of some plant growth regulators
Mentor/PI: Dr. Rajender Kumar, Dr. Roshni Rajamohan, Dr. Sourav Singh Deo
Number of students: Six
Project status: On-going
Description : The project is intended to observe the effects of plant growth regulators (Auxin, Gibberellic acid and cytokinin) on various physiological processes such as rooting, senescence, seed germination and growth. Besides understanding of physiological roles of plant growth regulators the results will be helpful for vegetative propagation through stem cuttings (rhizogenesis), increased shelf life green vegetables/plants (Senescence), cultivation and conservation of the species (seed germination).
Study of plant responses to various abiotic stresses
Mentor/PI: Dr. Kumar Shantanu, Dr. Rajender Kumar and Ms. Anjana Singh
Number of students: Four
Project status: On-going
Description : The project is designed to expose the plants to various abiotic stresses (salt, heavy metals) and to monitor physical and biochemical changes in response to the abiotic stress. The outcome will help to understand the role of certain metabolites (especially proline) and enzymes (anti-oxidative) in combating abiotic stress.
A two-day webinar on "Evolution of Science seen from Historical Perspective"
Convenor: Dr. Aparna Nautiyal
Date of the program: 12th and 13th May, 2020 from 3:00 pm to 4:30 pm via Google meet.
No. of participants: 250
Invited Speaker:
Professor Arun Kumar Pandey (Honorable Vice Chancellor, Mansarovar Global University Sehore, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh and former Dean of Colleges & Professor, Department of Botany, University of Delhi).
Dr. Rajendra Gupta (Former Associate Professor, Department of Botany, University of Delhi).
Description: On 12 th May, Prof. A. K. Pandey gave a talk on & quot;The Changing Paradigm of Flowering Plants Systematics & quot;. He enlightened the audience on the significance of naming plants in sciences, diversity in flowering plants and how molecular systematics plays an important role in study of different groups of plants. The presentation was full of beautiful illustrations of different rare and endangered plants. On 13 th May, Dr. R. Gupta spoke on “Walking with Ancestors-Naming Plants and Animals in the Ancient World”, wherein he explained the probable origin of naming of plants and animals during linguistic evolution.
An Invited Talk on “Transgenic and RNA silencing based strategies for crop protection against pathogens and insect pests”
Convenor: Dr. Anju Chhibbar, advisor Botanical society, Dr. Rajender Kumar (Teacher-in-Charge) and Dr. Dharmendra K. Mallick.
Date of the program: 18th September, 2019
No. of participants: More than 100
Invited Speaker: Professor M. V. Rajam (Department of Genetics, University of Delhi, South Campus)
Description: The invited talk was delivered by eminent Professor M.V. Rajam of the Department of Genetics, University of Delhi, South Campus. He talked about how RNA interference is a potent method using only a few double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) molecules of a particular gene to silence its expression, which has made it one of the hottest topics in molecular biology. The lecture was followed by an interactive question-answer session.
Invited talk on “Weather Forecasting, Climate Variability and its impacts” during the Botanical Fest, Sanjeevani.
Convenor: Dr. Anju Chhibbar
Date of the program: 31 January, 2020
No. of participants: All the students of B.Sc. (H) Botany and B.Sc. (P) Life Science participated.
Invited Speaker: Dr. Anand Sharma (DDGM, Indian Meteorological Department, Government of India, Mausam Bhawan)
Description: Dr. Anand Sharma (DDGM, Indian Meteorological Department, Government of India, Mausam Bhawan) gave a wonderful talk on Weather Forecasting, Climate Variability and its impacts. He interacted with the students and explained the basic principles of weather forecasting, highlighted the current scenario of world with reference to climate change and alsothrew light on the advancements in Indian Technology in weather forecast since last two decades.
One-week summer training programme in Plant Systematics
Convenor: Dr. Roshni Rajamohan Mathur
Time period: 31st May, 2019 to 6th June, 2019
Number of students: 26
Description: The summer training was conducted in collaboration with ICAR-BNPGR New Delhi and Botanic Garden of Indian Republic (BGIR), Noida. During the course, the participants had the opportunity to not only learn and discuss the basic concepts in Plant Systematics from the experts but also had hands-on training on how to identify, describe, name and publish a species and also on analysing DNA sequence data, DNA fingerprinting & 'DNA barcoding'. They also learnt the practices involved in ex-situ conservation.
Poster making competition on the theme " Coronavirus lockdown rejuvenates our environment"
Convenor: Dr. Dharmendra Kumar Mallick
Date of visit: 5th June 2020
Number of students: More than 100
Description: The topic of the competition was “Coronavirus lockdown rejuvenates our environment”. It was organized on the occasion of World Environment. More than 100 students from various universities from across the country participated.
A Botanical Trip to Yamuna Biodiversity Park
Convenor: Dr. Anju Chhibbar
Date of visit: 15th February, 2020
Number of students: 70
Description : A group of 70 students from B.Sc. (H) Botany and B.Sc. (P) Life Science were accompanied by the faculty members from Department of Botany. They learnt about the conservation work carried out in the park and vegetation types it harbours in great detail. They also observed various biotic interactions in the wetland ecosystem and also got a chance to visit a gene bank with varieties of vegetables, poly-houses and greenhouses maintained for the hardening of certain plant species.
A Field Visit to Botanical Garden of Indian Republic (BGIR), Noida
Convenor: Dr. Roshni Rajamohan Mathur
Date of Visit: 4th February, 2020
Number of Students: The students of B.Sc. (H) Botany IInd year were taken on a trip to Botanical garden of Indian Republic (BGIR), Noida for partial fulfillment of the CC10 Plant Systematics curriculum. They learnt about different varieties of plants in various habitats. They learnt the techniques of collection, documentation and preservation of plant material. They also learnt about the process of making as herbarium specimens.
Butterfly Count in Deshbandhu College Campus
Convenor: All Faculty members
Date of the Program: 16th September, 2019
Number of Students: More than 100
Description : The butterfly Census program was conducted under the guidance of Dr. Ishtiyak Ahmad, Education Officer, Bombay Natural History Society Conservation Education Centre (BNHS-CEC)- Delhi. Deshbandhu College campus was selected as one of the survey site for the Delhi Butterfly Census. A good no. of butterflies was observed, which is indicative of a reasonably good flora in campus. This encouraged students to plant more plants to attract butterflies.
Botanical excursion to Chopta, Uttarakhand
Convenor: Dr. Kumar Shantanu
Date of the Program: 12th to 16th September 2019
Number of Students: More than 100
Description : The students from B.Sc. (H) Botany and B.Sc. (P) Life Science, accompanied by members of Botany faculty, had an exciting educational trip to Chopta where they trekked to Tungnath up a mountainous track, which was beautiful lush green mountainous slop covered with trees and very rich in flora. On the way to Chopta the students also visited H. N. B. Garhwal Central University, Srinagar, where, the students were addressed by Prof. B.P. Chamola and other scientists and visited herbal garden and other fields as well.
Dragonfly Count in Deshbandhu College campus
Convenor: Dr. Anju Chhibbar
Date of the Program: 13th August 2019
Number of Students: More than 80
Description : Bombay Natural History Society’s Conservation Education Centre (BNHS-CEC)- Delhi, as a part of the Delhi Dragonfly month-2019 celebration, selected Deshbandhu College campus as one of the survey site for the Delhi dragonfly count. Dr. Ishteyak Ahemad, Education officer (BNHS-CEC) at Asola Bhatti Wildlife Sanctuary, conducted an interactive session with the participants on the ecological importance of dragonflies. It was followed by the Dragonfly count in our college campus.