PEOPLE

Prof. Nirakar Pradhan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biology at Hong Kong Baptist University. His research merges environmental engineering with a deep analysis of microbial ecosystems to build a predictive understanding of their function and harness them for a circular economy. His work focuses on engineering microbial communities for waste valorization and the production of value-added products. His lab combines detailed molecular analysis with mathematical modeling to optimize processes such as anaerobic digestion for resource recovery, biofuel and bioplastic production in microbial biorefineries, and the recovery of critical metals from e-waste using biohydrometallurgy. A key goal is to understand how microbes adapt to environmental stress, providing foundational knowledge for applications in environmental biotechnology.