Advisory Board and Editors Molecular Biology

Journal Factsheet
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I told my colleagues that PeerJ is a journal where they need to publish if they want their paper to be published quickly and with the strict peer review expected from a good journal.
Sohath Vanegas,
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Diaa Abd El-Moneim

My academic journey began with an MSc in Plant Breeding and Genetics at Suez Canal University, where my research focused on evaluating drought tolerance and disease resistance in wheat, providing a solid foundation in abiotic stress tolerance. This early work fueled my commitment to understanding and addressing plant resilience under stress conditions. Thanks to an Erasmus Mundus scholarship, I pursued my PhD at Complutense University of Madrid, where I investigated the molecular mechanisms underlying aluminum stress tolerance in rye. Notably, I was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship funded by AECID just before defending my thesis—a pivotal achievement that underscored the relevance of my research. This fellowship enabled me to join the National Center of Biotechnology (CNB) in Madrid. I gained expertise in proteomics, gene expression analysis, and molecular tool development to improve plant abiotic stress resilience. These experiences greatly expanded my knowledge of gene regulation and stress physiology and led to high-impact publications in peer-reviewed journals.
Dr. Abd El Moneim’s research encompasses multiple domains, including the study of morphological , physiological, and molecular mechanisms that govern plant responses to stress factors such as salinity, drought , aluminum toxicity, heat, and pathogens. His work in identifying gene families and stress-responsive proteins is complemented by his efforts to apply DNA barcoding and chloroplast genomic assemblies for species identification and development of molecular markers, as well as contributing to taxonomical and evolutionary concepts and identifying transcriptional regulators critical for stress adaptation, with particular emphasis on crops like wheat and wild plants adapted to extreme environments. His methodologies include designing and analyzing field trials , protein analysis, nucleic acid extraction, fingerprinting , GWAS , and the characterization of chloroplast genomes. Dr. Abd El Moneim’s expertise in molecular breeding and genomics focuses on improving abiotic stress tolerance in staple crops, especially for agriculture in developing countries.

Mohd Adnan

Dr. Mohd Adnan is an Associate Professor, Principal Investigator and Head of Academic Committee at Department of Biology, College of Science, University of Hail, Saudi Arabia. He did his PhD from University of Central Lancashire, UK; Master’s and Bachelor’s degree from Bangalore University, India; Post Graduate Diploma in Bioinformatics from SJAIT, India. He has more than 12 years of research, teaching and administrative experience. In his professional capacity, he has received various travel, observership and research grants as a Principal Investigator from various prestigious organizations.
He has successfully published 200+ publications in internationally recognized peer reviewed reputed journals, several book chapters for internationally renowned publishers and presented many papers and posters in various conferences/workshops globally. He has published widely in the field of phytomedicine, biofilms, drug discovery, natural products, nutraceuticals and functional foods with specialization in plant-based antibiofilm and anticancer agents, microbial biosurfactants, biofilms in food industry and medical settings, probiotics and cancer biology, novel biomolecules for/as health and antimicrobial agents.
He has reviewed 350+ manuscripts for 70+ internationally recognized peer-reviewed JCR journals and grant reviewer for many prestigious universities and organisations. In addition, he is a member of SFAM, UK and ESCMID, Switzerland and an Elected Member of Royal Society of Biology, UK. He also currently holds different editorial positions (Associate, Academic, Guest and Review Editor) in various esteemed journals and has edited 500+ manuscripts.

Faheem Ahmad

Dr. Faheem Ahmad is Assistant Professor of Plant Pathology and Nematology in the Department of Botany at Aligarh Muslim University, India. Author of over 40 peer-reviewed publications, his research interests include plant-nematode interaction, mass spectrometry-based metabolomics, nematode management and nematicidal bioagents.

Syed Mudasir Ahmad

Dr. Syed Mudasir Ahmad is a Professor at the Division of Animal Biotechnology, Faculty of Veterinary Sciences and Animal Husbandry at Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Kashmir, India. Dr. Mudasir has done his PhD in Biotechnology from Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi and Post-doctorate from the university of California, Berkeley USA. He has more than 15 years of research and teaching experience. He is recipient of several national and international awards and fellowships. The areas of his research include Animal genomics and bioinformatics. He has been working on Animal health and production using omics approaches like transcriptomics, proteomics and epigenetics. The main focus of his research is to analyze gene expression across a wide range of different tissues and cell types from multiple developmental stages. He is using mammalian cell models to understand the regulatory mechanisms for gene expression of both coding and noncoding RNAs and their signaling pathways. He is also targeting Stem cells for tissue regeneration in animals. Dr. Mudasir is the author of many books in the field of his research. He is also editorial board member of several reputed journals.

Md Atique Ahmed

Dr Md Atique Ahmed is at present working as a Scientist under the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Govt. of India at the Regional centre of Northeast India (RMRC, NE), Dibrugarh, Assam, India.

Dr Ahmed's scientific career has been dedicated to the study of protozoan parasites in humans and primates, which includes all Plasmodium species, primarily Plasmodium falciparum, Plasmodium vivax, Plasmodium ovale and Plasmodium knowlesi. He has genetically and functionally characterised many plasmodium invasion antigens. His research interest mainly focuses population genetics/gemomics of Plasmodium parasites.

Tracy D Ainsworth

I am a senior research fellow studying marine organism responses to environmental change based at James Cook University in ARC Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies. I undertook my PhD at the University of Queensland where my thesis investigated links between stress and disease in reef building corals. My research encompasses coral biology, microbial ecology, molecular biology, and I utilize a whole organism/ whole system approach to understanding change in marine systems.

Jameel Al-Obaidi

Dr. Jameel R. Al-Obaidi obtained his PhD in Molecular biology from the University of Malaya, Malaysia. After completing his PhD, Dr Al-Obaidi worked for 7 years at the National Institutes of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, Malaysia as a senior research officer and then research director. He is currently a lecturer at the Department of Biology, Faculty of Sciences and Mathematics, Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris. Dr. Al-Obaidi's current research interests include but are not limited to research in Molecular biology, proteomics, protein markers, metabolomics, bioinformatics, plant disease and edible mushroom research.

He has published more than 50 scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals and contributed to 6 books. He has received local and international grants. He is involved in a number of national and international research projects around the world. Currently, Dr. Al-Obaidi serves as an editor in PLOS ONE, BMC Molecular and Cell Biology, PeerJ and Journal of Tropical Medicine, he is also a reviewer of several high-impact international scientific journals from Elsevier, Springer Nature, Taylor and Francis, and John Wiley Publishers.

Sonja-Verena Albers

Researching the assembly of cell surface appendages in archaea and their role in adhesion and biofilm formation. The model organism we study is the hyperthermophilic archaeon Sulfolobus acidocaldarius. We use genetic approaches to identify systems in Sulfolobus that are involved in the assembly of cell surface appendages and biochemically characterize the subunits and their interplay in the assembly process.

Heike Allgayer

Research fields include translational research, invasion, metastasis, disseminated tumor cells, transcription, tumor-associated proteolysis, targeted therapy, micro-RNA, molecular staging of cancer. Associate Editor of the International Journal of Cancer, and on the Editorial Boards of: Advances in Medical Sciences, Journal of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, Frontiers in Molecular and Cellular Oncology, The Open Surgical Oncology Journal.

Zekiye Sultan Altun

The Zekiye Altun Professor of Biochemistry and Basic Oncology, Dokuz Eylul University. Member of the Cell Death Research Society of Turkey and Basic Oncology Society.

Vivek Anantharaman

Computational biology Staff Scientist, Aravind Group, at the Computational Biology Branch, National Center for Biotechnology Information, National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, Maryland). Research interest includes studying protein structure, function and sequence, evolution of domains and biological systems to glean information about the biology of organisms.

Rodolfo Aramayo

My laboratory is centered on understanding the function(s) of RNAs, especially non-coding RNAs in all aspects of Biology. The long term objective of our work is to understand meiotic silencing in Neurospora and to map its connections with the meiotic silencing observed in other organisms.

B.S. in Molecular Biology, University of Brasilia, 1982
M.S. in Molecular Biology, University of Brasilia, 1986
Ph.D. in Genetics, University of Georgia (Athens), 1992
Postdoctoral Training, University of Wisconsin Madison, 1993
Postdoctoral Training, Stanford University, 1997