Kandikere R. Sridhar is an adjunct faculty member at Mangalore University, India. His primary area of study is aquatic fungi in freshwater and marine waters. He has research collaborations in the USA, Canada, Germany, Switzerland, and Portugal. He was president of the Mycological Society of India (2018), a distinguished Asian mycologist (2015), and one of the world's top 2% scientists in the field of mycology (2019-24).

Sunil K. Deshmukh is a Scientific Advisor to Greenvention Biotech, Uruli-Kanchan, Pune, India, and Agpharm Bioinnovations LLP, Patiala, Punjab, India. A, veteran industrial mycologist, he has spent a substantial part of his career in drug discovery at Hoechst Marion Roussel Limited (now Sanofi India Ltd.), Mumbai, and Piramal Enterprises Limited, Mumbai. He has also served as an Adjunct Associate Professor at Deakin University, Australia.