This time Scientific Bangladesh has talked with Dr. Atiar Rahman. He a professor, Chair of the 
department and the principal investigator (PI) of Laboratory of Alternative Medicine and Natural Product Research in Chittagong University. He has shared many important and interesting insights in this interview. Let’s read what he shares.
1. Scientific Bangladesh: Would you like to tell us about your academic and research life? other way, how would you like to introduce yourself to our readers?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: First of all, I would like to thank Scientific Bangladesh to provide me an opportunity to be shared with its readers. I born in Jessore in 1975 and completed my school life locally thereby moving to Jessore Cantonment College for my HSC. I completed my B.Sc. Honours and MS from the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Dhaka and joined to the University of Chittagong as a lecturer of the same Dept. in 2004 through a short-untracked job in between. After completing my PhD from Japan, got back to University of Chittagong and concentrated to full-fledged teaching and research putting endeavour in creating small facilities for research. Currently, I am working as a professor, Chair of the department and the principal investigator (PI) of Laboratory of Alternative Medicine and Natural Product Research as well.
2.Scientific Bangladesh: What has made you researcher and/or teacher? In other way, what is the story behind your becoming researcher?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: I have been brought up through a deep mix of pleasures and pains received from my teachers since primary to University levels. Few of them greatly enjoined to me stimulate becoming a teacher while others as well did so to be with the students while they are in need. I have always had a real passion for disadvantaged students and the desire to pass this on to others and to help back-benchers was my main reason for deciding to be a teacher indeed. Getting into this profession, within the sooner convenience I realized the droughts of knowledge-producing endeavour of our universities are indispensable to be mitigated, multidimensional setbacks keeping the universities and institutions away from researches need to be optimized; all these led me to do my best even in a very tiny extent. Fortunately, I started up my research with 15000.00 takas received from Chittagong University Research Cell. Now it is my passion and love, I cannot but pass even a single second without placing it in my mind to blow.
3.Scientific Bangladesh: How do you manage fund for research? From where you get fund for research?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: I think this is very significant question for the early career researchers and fresher’s in this avenue. As I mentioned in my last answer, I started doing with the seed money received from my affiliated University Research Cell. With the expansion of my journey I came to know the streets and paths where to go for applying to get research fund. I am blessed to share that the hard-mix of both small and big funds from Chittagong University Research and Publication Cell, University Grants Commission Bangladesh, Ministry of Science and Technology, Bangladesh Agriculture Research Council (BARC), Ministry of Education fed my research so far. Additionally, some other national and international collaborations supplemented my research in diverse manners to mitigate the crises of funds.
4. Scientific Bangladesh: Do you think Bangladeshi researchers apply enough for international funds?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: Obviously, the globe becomes like a football now to play it with. There is lot of funding sources, over the world, which could be explored no matter where you are from. The World Academy of Sciences, USAID, Bill Melinda Gates Foundation, NIH, JSPS, and so many opportunities for international funding sources, cited by Web of Science, for Bangladeshi Researchers are open to apply.
5. Scientific Bangladesh: Inadequate fund for research is a major problem in Bangladesh.
Dr. Atiar Rahman: What would you say in response to pointing fingers by many to this basic problem worldwide, not only in Bangladesh?
The flavor of the question is too some extent a fact but not the concrete, my opinion. First of all, the funding is rather challenging to be availed but not impossible. Achieving fund depends on how unique, scientifically sound, need-based, worth-merit, groundbreaking, knowledge-generating and problem solving the research project is. The articulation of project preparation also does reflect the allocation of fund. The answer could be extended with more supplements that even in our country the opportunities for research funding has been much widened than any other time it was. For instance, University of Chittagong is currently offering around 5 lacs taka per project which was only fifty thousand a couple years back. Many other universities are doing similarly. Ministry of Education has launched a GARE project a few years back and offering very handsome amount of funds for attractive research projects. University Grants Commission also changed their slot of research grant, not skyscraping but seeding the research, in every category and fresher’s can apply for starting up their research. Established researchers are encouraged to apply for GARE, USAID, TWAS, NIH and some other relevant international funds. Importantly, many of the international funding is appreciably offered with a prior collaborative mode in between; thus international collaborations are highly promoting to apply for big-budgeted research funds.
6.Scientific Bangladesh: What is your research area? What type of research facilities/ infrastructures you have or developed over years and how?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: My research area is Alternative Medicine and Natural Product. Our focus is carrying out the research to explore the novel and indigenous phytomedicinal and functional food sources as alternative therapeutics to deliver in the cellular target with molecular observation. Our especial interest is type 2 diabetes and chemical induced acute hepatic toxicity, which are intervened to reverse using the undelivered phytopharmacologically potential Bangladeshi medicinal plants/plant products in animal model with all prior in vitro works which are further justified with molecular simulation approaches. We have a well-infrastructured laboratory equipped with reversed-phase semi-quantitative HPLC, LCMS, Nanodrop spectrophotometer, UV-VIS spectrophotometer, Next generation DNA sequencer, Real time PCR, Flowcytometry, multi-approached centrifuge devices, A2 Biosafety cabinet, Highly purified water supply (MilliQ), cold chamber, Cell-line facility etc along with others required for smaller daily necessities.
7. Scientific Bangladesh: Tell us about your publications and patent, if any. Tell more about your most loved publication/s and/or patents.
Dr. Atiar Rahman: I have published almost around 95 articles, few book chapters, reviews in peer-reviewed internationally recognized journals published by reputed publishers such as Elsevier, Springer, Wiley, Taylor and Francis, Biomed Central, MDPI, Hindawi etc. Impact factor, indexing and publishers reputation in scientific world are our consideration to publish our articles. Our most loved articles are published in Phytomedicine, Biomedicine and Pharmacotherapy, Frontiers in Pharmacology, Journal of Food Science, Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine, Biomolecules, Nutrients, BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine etc.
8. Scientific Bangladesh: Would you like to share your google scholar, LinkedIn or any other profile?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: It’s my pleasure to share my all social and socio-scientific links to be reached by the researchers and my peers:
Google scholar profile: https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=Hrbt-8QAAAAJ
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/atiar-rahman-324b4524?trk=hp-identity-name
Twitter: https://twitter.com/atique06
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4902-8923
Researcher ID: https://publons.com/researcher/362002/rahman-md-atiar/
Scopus ID: https://www.scopus.com/authid/detail.uri?authorId=55457954600
LiveDNA: https://livedna.org/880.19039 RG score: 30.13 on 4 August 2020
Laboratory webpage: www.am-npr.org
Institutional Webpage: www.cu.ac.bd
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/atiar.atique.9
9. Scientific Bangladesh: Tells us about research grants and awards you have obtained till now.
Dr. Atiar Rahman: I am glad to share with the readers of scientific Bangladesh that I have been awarded for quite a good number of research grants listed as follows:
1. Research Grant from University Research Cell (2007-2008).
2. Special Research Allocation from the Ministry of Science, Information and Technology, Bangladesh (2007-2008, 2013, 2015-16, 2017-18).
3. Research Grant from University Grant Commission, Bangladesh (2008-2009, 2013, 2016, 2018).
4. Special Research Allocation from University Grant Commission Bangladesh, UGC-Dean, (2009-10, 2015-16).
5. Ressearch grant from BARC with the head of National Agricultural Technology Project Phase-I (NATP-I/PIU- BARC-56/SPGR-P/2008 (Vol II)/3291 (2011-13).
6. Research Grant from University Research and Publication Cell, University of Chittagong, 2013, 2018, 2019.
7. Research grant 2019 from BANBEIS (Ministry of Education, GARE) for three years (2019-2021).
I am also blessed to be awarded for AASSA President’s Young scientist Award 2018 by Bangladesh Academy of Sciences, Travel Award 2018 jointly by US Academy of Science, Engineering and Medicine and Academy of Science Malaysia, Best speaker award 2017 by Annamali University, India, Biosafety Award 2017 by Bangladesh Biosafety and Biosecurity Society. Apart from the above, I have received many best poster presenter awards, extra-curricular awards not to mention.
10. Scientific Bangladesh: How many researchers (PhDs and Masters) have you developed by this time? In other words, share your supervising story.
Dr. Atiar Rahman: In the University of Chittagong, an associate professor having Phd degree qualifies for accepting PhD student and I achieved that at the end of 2013. After that I started receiving students and I am currently supervising two PhD students, six M.Phil and seven MS students. However, I have so far supervised more than forty-eight MS students in the last 13 years.
11. Scientific Bangladesh: What 1. qualities and 2. skills you expect in prospective researchers?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: Prospective researcher, an innate talent or acquired skills is a big question. To me, irrespective of the research area and disciplines, every prospective researcher is highly expected to have the utmost passion and fascination, self-motivation, commitment as well as dedication for adopting critical way of thinking for research. By the way, to make the research translational, a research obviously demands the researcher to have adequate skill and understanding on the methodological outreach of research, project design and hunting, research design, research problem, research question and research hypothesis. Report writing, critical data analysis and interpretations are truly the skill for prospective researchers do require. However, ethics and principles are truly inevitable to desire from a prospective researcher.
12.Scientific Bangladesh: What are the professional organizations of researchers you involved with? How important it for researchers to join such professional bodies?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: Currently, I am strongly attached with Bangladesh Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (BSBMB-life member and Joint secretary), Bangladesh Biosafety and Biosecurity Society (BBBS-life member and divisional coordinator), National Young Academy Bangladesh (NYAB-vice president), Global Network of Bangladeshi Biotechnologists (GNOBB-Life Member), Asian Federation of Biotechnology (AFOB), The Asian Society for Pharmacognosy (AJP-Board Director), Asian Food Safety and Security Association (AFSA-Life member), Graduate Biochemists Association, Graduate Microbiologist Association. The second part of the question is very important indeed. A researcher’s involvement and association with professional research organizations is highly prescribed and suggested for understanding the modes for knowledge production, knowledge sharing and dynamics of new knowledge. Another important is the scientific leadership for promoting research which could be enforced through interactions with such professional bodies.
13.Scientific Bangladesh: Do you think different professional bodies of scientists playing their due role in Bangladesh? What are your suggestions for the leading professional organizations of scientists?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: The holistic approaches, scope and opportunity for professional bodies to work and contribute duly for the betterment of science sometimes and somewhat seem inadequate and insufficient in Bangladesh. However, many scientists either in group or as an individual doing well despite multifaceted constrains in a science-progressing social circumstances. Political decisions and influences also sometimes matter in all these procedures. Therefore, I recommend the professional bodies need to maintain a quite professionalism, builds science-based leadership free from conventional tedious attitude, young should be patronized and nurtured for future scientific leadership, distinguished and dedicated Bangladeshi expatriate scientists should be welcomed to lead these premises.
14. Scientific Bangladesh: How important is leadership ability to become a great researcher? Should researchers take leadership training? Did you ever get training on Leadership?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: Very true but unfortunate! Research leadership, a much-neglected area of educational leadership and management, is disadvantaged by having an underdeveloped and inadequate knowledge. I think it is highly significant area to focus the propositional knowledge as an original theoretical model of the componential structure of researcher development basically based on behavioral development; attitudinal development; and intellectual development of the researchers to change the research environment and policy-level which eventually leads to transfigure the holistic national guidelines for research, research priority, research for state-building and research for humanitarian ground. In particular, it is important that research leaders recognize the width, multidimensional and complexity of researcher development: that it is much more than changing observable behavior and increasing productivity and output; it also involves changing viewpoints, mindsets, perceptions and increasing intellectual capacity.
Three specific features of professorial research leadership are theoretically accepted as modes of motivation: influence that enhances people’s capacity to make appropriate choices, to achieve requisite standards, and to affect processes. Regarding all these I said, researchers should have obligatory leadership training. I had a small privilege to have professional leadership training from commonwealth executive MBA courses.
15. Scientific Bangladesh: If asked what will be your three advice for Science Ministry of Bangladesh?
Dr. Atiar Rahman: I think those could be placed as suggestion or recommendation rather than advises. First of all, Ministry of Science and Technology should identify the most prospective research areas and segregate the researchers for that particular area based on their standard of publications; secondly, they should fund truly based on research potentials, disregarding any other issues, and amount of allocation should be based on researchers sole research capability where evaluators should come from truly research-fascinated highly potential researchers; and, thirdly, young researchers should be targeted for nurturing, contextualizing the advancement of science over the globe, to fulfill the future needs of the nation obviously not in a general approach.
16. Scientific Bangladesh? Would you like to add any more point for our readers?
Dr. Atiar Rahman:
What I love to add, everywhere there are some problems and prospects, so disappointment and complain could not be the solutions. Rather, exploration something brighter from the garbage can show the paths for others who are frustrated. Let us use our limited resources, constraint facility and showcase the best with your dedication, patience and integrity. Hope your days will be changed.
