Characterization of ornamental crops 

 Edible flowers: new source of functional food

• Awarded Merit Certificate in Matriculation.
• Received University Merit Fellowship during B.Sc. degree programme.
• Received Certificate of Honour in B.Sc. degree programme.
• Received ICAR - Junior Research Fellowship for M.Sc. 
• Received ICAR - Senior Research Fellowship for Ph.D. 
• Received IARI- Senior Research Fellowship for Ph.D. (Floriculture & Landscaping).
• Awarded with UGC- Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowship for Ph.D. 
• Qualified ICAR-NET (Floriculture and Landscaping) in 2013 and in 2016.

• Samkaria, S. and Kumari, P*., 2025. Wild Edible Flowers of Indian Himalayan Region, Their Traditional Uses and Potential Health Benefits: A Way Forward for Food and Nutritional Security. Plant Foods for Human Nutrition, 80(1), p.60.
• Tosif, M.M., Bains, A., Chawla, P., Paul, S., Kumari, P., Dhull, S.B., Ali, N. and Goksen, G., 2025. Optimizing starch-free arabinogalactan-rich taro nanomucilage: Green experimental design, structural elucidation, amino acid profiling, and biological properties. Food Chemistry, p.143731.
• Kharwal, D. and Kumari, P*., 2024. Standardization of resin and hardener mixing conditions for optimal preservation of dried flowers. Journal of Ornamental Horticulture, 27(2), pp.139-145.
• Hegde, A.S., Gupta, S., Kumari, P*., Joshi, R*. and Srivatsan, V*., 2023. Wild Edible Flowers of Western Himalayas: Nutritional Characterization, UHPLC-QTOF-IMS-Based Phytochemical Profiling, Antioxidant Properties, and In Vitro Bioaccessibility of Polyphenols. ACS omega, 8(43), pp.40212-40228.
• Sharma, S., and Kumari, P*., 2023. Evaluating the Phytochemical Composition and Antioxidant Activity of Leaves of Different Rose Varieties. International Journal of Plant Biology, 14(4), pp.1051-1063.
• Malviya, D., Singh, P., Singh, U.B., Paul, S., Kumar Bisen, P., Rai, J.P., Verma, R.L., Fiyaz, R.A., Kumar, A., Kumari, P. and Dei, S., 2023. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi-mediated activation of plant defense responses in direct seeded rice (Oryza sativa L.) against root-knot nematode Meloidogyne graminicola. Frontiers in Microbiology, 14, p.1104490.
• Sharma, R., Kumari, P., Sahare, H. and Paul, S., 2023. Insight to the biotechnological interventions in flower crops for abiotic stress tolerance. Scientia Horticulturae, 318, p.112102.
• Kumari, P*., Sharma, R., Panwar, S., Paul, S. and Banyal, N., 2023. Silicon as vital element in flower crop production. Journal of Plant Nutrition, 46(11), pp.2747-2762.
• Kumari, P*., Raju, D.V.S., Prasad, K.V., Saha, S., Panwar, S., Paul, S., Banyal, N., Bains, A., Chawla, P., Fogarasi, M. and Fogarasi, S., 2022. Characterization of anthocyanins and their antioxidant activities in Indian rose varieties (Rosa× hybrida) using HPLC. Antioxidants, 11(10), p.2032.
• Hegde, A.S., Gupta, S., Sharma, S., Srivatsan, V. and Kumari, P*., 2022. Edible rose flowers: A doorway to gastronomic and nutraceutical research. Food Research International, 162, p.111977.
• Poonam Kumari*, Ujala and Bhargava B. 2021. Phytochemicals from edible flowers: opening a new arena for healthy lifestyle. Journal of Functional Foods, 78: 104375.
• Sharma, S., Kumari, G. and Kumari, P*., 2021. Standardizing dehydration techniques for ornamental foliage plants. Journal of Ornamental Horticulture, 24(2), pp.136-142.
• Poonam Kumari, D.V.S. Raju, K.V. Prasad, Kanwar Pal Singh, Supradip Saha, Ajay Arora and Firoz Hossain. 2017. Quantification and correlation of anthocyanin pigments and their antioxidant activities in rose (Rosa hybrida) varieties. Indian Journal of Agricultural Sciences, 87 (10): 1340–6.
• Poonam Kumari, D.V.S. Raju, Kanwar Pal Singh, K.V. Prasad and Sapna Panwar. 2018. Characterization of phenolic compounds in petal extracts of rose (Rosa hybrida L.). Indian Journal of Horticulture, http://dx.doi.org/10.5958/0974-0112.2018.00060.
• Poonam Kumari, T. Manjunatha Rao, Anuradha Sane, Rajiv Kumar and M.V. Dhananjaya. 2016. Characterization of Fusarium wilt in resistant and susceptible gladiolus (Gladiolus spp) genotypes using DNA markers. Indian Journal of Agricultural Sciences, 86(7): 849–53.

Sonia Sharma, Shubham Samkaria, Garima Kumari, Mrinali Sood, Ananya Sood and Harman