Prasanna K. Mohanty (1934–2013): a great photosynthetiker and a wonderful human being who touched the hearts of many

Abstract

Prasanna K. Mohanty, a great scientist, a great teacher and above all a great human being, left us more than a year ago (on March 9, 2013). He was a pioneer in the field of photosynthesis research; his contributions are many and wide-ranging. In the words of Jack Myers, he would be a "photosynthetiker" par excellence. He remained deeply engaged with research almost to the end of his life; we believe that generations of researchers still to come will benefit from his thorough and enormous work. We present here his life and some of his contributions to the field of Photosynthesis Research. The response to this tribute was overwhelming and we have included most of the tributes, which we received from all over the world. Prasanna Mohanty was a pioneer in the field of "Light Regulation of Photosynthesis", a loving and dedicated teacher-unpretentious, idealistic, and an honest human being.

Comprehensive functional annotation of susceptibility variants identifies genetic heterogeneity between lung adenocarcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma

“…Our recent work also provided evidence for the specific association of immune infiltration with lung AD, and identified that inflammatory microenvironments formed in the early stage of lung AD [23], suggesting that immune infiltration occurring in the initial stage is the major risk factor for lung AD. As an indication of genomic instability [65], elevated somatic HRD level has also been reported in lung SqCC [43]. The strong association between lung SqCC susceptibility genes and HRD observed in this study provided additional evidence that the somatic differences may have genetic ancestry origins and could regulate lung SqCC risk.…”

Govindjee’s 90th birthday – Congratulations from friends and colleagues

“…Govindjee asked whether I would help him with the tribute to Prasanna, and I readily agreed. This tribute was published in Photosynthesis Research [35]. Govindjee was also the driving force to initiate 'The Prasanna Mohanty fund for young scientists,' to be awarded by the International Society of Photosynthesis Research.…”

Biology and biotechnological applications of microalgae and photosynthetic prokaryotes: part 2

“…Kamal Ruhil School of Life Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India; e-mail: kamalruhil@gmail.com I did my PhD under Professor of Baishnab C. Tripathy, who was a student of the late Professor Prasanna Mohanty (see: Tiwari et al 2014), who, in turn, was a student of Govindjee. My first introduction of Govindjee was, as done by my seniors and peers, that Govind Ji (as was his original name in India) and Photosynthesis are synonyms.…”

“…He has been always very kind to me and it is always pleasant meeting him. I consider Govindjee (who prefers to be called by his first name) as my 'scientific grandfather' since my PhD supervisor Prof Prasanna Mohanty had been my scientific 'father' (for a Tribute to Mohanty, see Tiwari et al 2014). Therefore, the roots of my research contributions to the field of photosynthesis had originated in Govindjee.…”