Mahendra Rai is a UGC-BSR faculty fellow and former professor and head of the Department of Biotechnology at Amravati University in Maharashtra, India. He has authored more than 450 research papers, 102 popular articles in both Indian and international journals, and has had over 70 books published by reputed publishers such as Elsevier, Springer, CRC, Taylor and Francis, Wiley, and Scientific Publisher. He is a member of several scientific societies and has been a national Scholar for five years. He received several prestigious awards, including the Father T.A. Mathias Award (1989) from the All India Association for Christian Higher Education, and the Medini Award (1999) from the Department of Environment and Forest, Government of India. He also received a SERC visiting fellowship from the Department of Science and Technology in 1996, was an INSA visiting fellowship from the Indian National Science Academy in 1998, and a TWAS-UNESCO Associateship in Italy in 2002. He serves as a referee for 20 international journals and is a member of the editorial board of 10 national and international journals. He has approximately three decades of teaching and research experience. The main focus of his research is plant and nano-based bioactives against human pathogenic microbes.