Department of Microbiology

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The departmental library has been enriched with adequate number of moderrn, current text books within this short span of time.

The pace of advancement of the discipline and its societal relevance enhanced impressively in the context of scope and relevance of the subject in the different fields of applied microbiology with the application of biotechnology and genetic engineering. However, the inter-disciplinary approach of the subject is imperative in the present scenario. The University of Kalyani felt such importance and proposed to start the Microbiology course at post-graduate level from 2001. The cooperation of the teachers of the interacting Departments of the University has been ensured, so as to bring together all the relevant disciplines in a common platform to impart this multidisciplinary course.

Microbiology has taken a unique position in respect of basic and applied aspects of food and dairy products, environment, agriculture, various industries and medical and public health.

The course would help the aspirant graduates in getting a broad based knowledge about theoretical and applied aspects of different disciplines of microbiology in general and its frontier areas in particular. It is aimed at offering high quality training and generating expertise in the frontier areas of microbial technology, and to provide appreciative atmosphere to the bright young talents. The course includes inter-alia, collaborative efforts with different institutes, industries, clinical laboratories and other agencies. Hence, the post-graduate course may open multi-channel opportunity of employment and entrepreneurship.

The Post–Graduate course in Microbiology, recognized by UGC and Government of West Bengal, was offered for the first time in the academic session of 2001-2003. Since 2004 the course has been renamed as Microbiology & Microbial Technology with updated syllabi.

The course comprises of 4 semesters in two academic years.

Student intake

Sixteen (16) students:

11 students (at least 1 each from Honours Graduates in Botany,  Chemistry,  Physiology,  Zoology,  Molecular  Biology/ Biotechnology and Biochemistry; and 5 from the Microbiology Honours Graduates).
Reserved Category : 5 from any subject as cited in eligibility criteria.

If vacancy arises candidate from respective wait-listed subject merit list may be admitted in order of merit; in case of non-availability of eligible candidate from subject merit list candidate from thecomposite merit list may be admitted in order of merit.

Honours graduates (10 + 2 + 3 system) with at least 50%  marks  in  Microbiology/  Botany/  Zoology/ Chemistry/ Physiology/ Biochemistry/ Molecular Biology and/or  Biotechnology  Honours  from  any  recognized  University  or Institute.   Honours graduates other than Chemistry/ Biochemistry shall have Chemistry as a general subject in degree course.

 All the eligible applicants will have to sit in an admission test. The medium of instructions and examination shall be in English. Admission test will be of 75 minutes with 100 full marks. The questions will be objective type  (Chemistry portion – B.Sc. general level; Biology, Physics, Mathematics, Physiology, Biochemistry and Microbiology portions  -Basic/ H.S. level).

Candidates will be admitted according to the separate merit listprepared for each subject from the weighted average of the marks (in percentage) obtained in the Honours subject of the B.Sc. examination (50%),  in  the  admission  test (40%)  and  in  H.S  or  its  equivalent examination (10%). If students from any of the above disciplines are not available, the seat(s) will be filled in accordance to the order of merit in the composite merit list prepared taking all the candidates of all the subjects as mentioned earlier. If a candidate fails to secure 45% in weighted average of the marks as stated above, he/she will not be eligible for admission. If any vacancy arises in the General category, the vacancy will be filled up either from the merit list of the concerned subject or from the composite merit list (if there is no available student of the concerned subject). The admission in the Reserved Category will be from  the  composite  merit  list  of  such  candidates, irrespective of their Honours subject in B.Sc. Course as mentioned in the eligibility part.

General Category : Tuition fees – Rs. 20,000/- per semester;

Students have to undertake a supervised research project at different laboratories of National Research/ Academic Institutes of repute to update their knowledge on the recent trends of Microbiology. In the final semester the student will get the opportunity to interact with the industries related to pharmaceuticals, food & soft drinks, brewing, diary products etc. and have to prepare a project report based on their experiences. The Departmental student’s seminar, lecture, group discussion, class test tutorial in the field of fundamental, advanced or specialized areas equip the students for build up their carrier.

Eminent teachers and researchers from the different Departments of the University of Kalyani, Calcutta University, University of Burdwan, Bose Institute, National Institute of Cholera and Enteric Diseases, School of Tropical Medicine, Indian Institute of Chemical Biology, Central Inland Fisheries Research Institute, National Institute of Technical Teachers’ Training Institute, Govt. College of Engineering and Leather Technology, Directorate of Milk, Govt. of West Bengal and Kalyani Govt. Engineering College acted as resource persons and delivered class lectures.

Since the inception, the Department has started extensive research programme on different thrust area. Some Researchers from different National Institutes and Universities/ foreign University are also involved in the research programme in the field of Environmental Microbiology and Molecular biology.
Ten candidates have registered their name for the Ph.D. degree. Two of them are working under University Research Scheme, two college teachers have been working as Teacher Fellow under the Faculty Improvement Programme of UGC and six are working here in collaboration with eminent researchers from National Institutes and foreign university.

1. Development of microbial consortia for heavy metal/ xenobiotics remediation, biological control of plant diseases and plant growth promotion.
2. Molecular & Biochemical mechanism of heavy metal tolerance in microbes.
3. Cell cycle regulation in Mycobacterium.
4. Epidemiological study of Phytophthora diseases in crop plant and molecular characterization of Phytophthora isolates.
5. Aquaculture microbiology.

• Biomedical Research Laboratory, University of Texas Health Center, Tyler, USA
• Microbiology Lab., CIFRI, ICAR, Barrackpore
• Regional Research Laboratory, Bhubaneshwar
• Crop Research & Plant Pathology Unit, BCKV, West Bengal

• A new report on Phytophthora melonis and its host range (Published).
• Regulatory role of FtsH on mycobacterial cell cycle (Communicated).
• A highly cadmium tolerant Pseudomonas aeruginosa KUCd1 having Cd removal ability and PGPR activity (Presented & Communicated).
• GenBank Accession of 30 Phytophthora isolates from West Bengal (Ref. NCBI).

1. Guharoy, S., Bhattacharyya, S., Mukherjee, S.K., Mandal, N. and Khatua, D.C. 2006. Phytophthora melonis associated with fruit and vine rot disease of pointed gourd in India as revealed by RFLP and sequencing of ITS region. J. Phyopathol. 154: 612-615.
2. Sinha, S. and Mukherjee, S.K. 2006. Isolation and characterization of bacterial strain highly resistant to cadmium. In – International Symposium on “Agriculturally important Microorganisms : Conservation, Utilization, Bioremediation and Ecological Significance”. IMS, Kolkata.
3. Guharoy, S., Mukherjee, S.K., Khatua, D.C. and Bhattacharyya, S. 2006. Analysis of diversity among Indian Phytophthora isolates prevalent on some common important crops through morphological and molecular methods. In – International Symposium on “Agriculturally important Microorganisms : Conservation, Utilization, Bioremediation and Ecological Significance”. IMS, Kolkata.
4. Guharoy, S., Chakraborty, S., Sinha, S. and Mukherjee, S.K. 2006. Biological control of Phytophthora spp. With a novel indigenous Pseudomonas isolate. In – International Symposium on “Agriculturally important Microorganisms : Conservation, Utilization, Bioremediation and Ecological Significance”. IMS, Kolkata.

One day workshop was arranged for the enrichment of course curriculum.

 Tuition fees – Rs.50,000/- per semester.
Other fees are the same as per University rules.