Training on “Omics Tools and Techniques for Nutrition Evaluation and Enhancement” was organized at Division of Biochemistry, IARI from January 09 – 20, 2020 under the aegis of World Bank – ICAR funded NATIONAL AGRICULTURAL HIGHER EDUCATION PROJECT Centre for Advanced Agricultural Sciences and technology (CAAST) on Genomics-Assisted Crop Improvement and Management. The training was organized under the dynamic leadership of Dr. Shelly Praveen, Course Director & Head, Dr. Ranjeet R. Kumar, Senior Scientist (Coordinator) and Dr. Suneha Goswami, Scientist (Coordinator). We received 125 applications from SAUs and ICAR institutes from different part of the India. The applications were screened based on education qualifications, research areas, future research planning and a paragraph on how training will help them in future. Based on the screening, 33 students were selected from different states of India. The demographic stat of the trainees: General – 54.5%, OBC – 24.3% and SC/ST – 21.2%.

The training was inaugurated by Dr. A. K. Singh (honourable Director IARI) in presence of Dr. A. K. Singh (Joint Director Research, IARI) and Dr. Viswanathan C. (PI, NAHEP-CAAST). The training programme had renounced speakers from different institutes and total of 18 talks were delivered in recent and advanced tools and techniques related to nutrition. 10 hands-on-practical related to nutrition like storage protein profiling, starch estimation, resistant starch estimation, etc were conducted.  Evening talk was organized under the theme SCIENCE FOR FUTURE (S4F) which was delivered by renowned scientists of ICAR. The trainees were also exposed to various facilities at IARI like NANAJI DESHMUKH PLANT PHENOMICS CENTRE, National Phytotron facility, etc. In order to motivate the trainees, a quiz competition was also organized on recent happening in science and technology. Pre-evaluation and post evaluation tests were conducted and significant up gradation in the knowledge of the trainees was observed. The valedictory was organized on 20^th January, 2020 and certificates were distributed by our honourable Director, IARI.