Share This Article
Piyusha Sharma is a biotechnologist and an active academician. She is currently working with Desh Bhagat University Mandi Gobindgarh and pursuing her Ph.D. on developing a hair dye that is oil-based. She is an alumna of Lovely Professional University having completed her M.Sc. and M.Phil. Biotechnology in the year 2010. She is into academia for the past 8 years.
Thank you so much, Ms. Piyusha Sharma, for the interview
Inkpothub: Tell us about your research work.
Ms. Piyusha: My research is focused on developing a hair dye that is oil-based. The objective was to provide a pure herbal solution for grey hair. Hair, as we all know, is an imperative part of our body that is an important parameter of beauty. It plays a vital role in the appearance of both men and women for gender identification as well. But due to the modern lifestyle and deteriorating quality of weather and food, people of almost all age group irrespective of gender, are facing the problem of grey hair. To overcome this issue many hair dyes are available in the market that is chemical-based and herbal based as well but both have side effects. The formulation that we have developed is purely herb-based so it does not have any side effects. The pipeline of steps in developing it includes an extensive review of scientific literature for proofreading and a fine selection of herbs that is well known to produce a color effect. These herbs were collected from authenticated sources and oil was developed.
Inkpothub: What motivated you to work in this area?
Ms. Piyusha: I always wanted to work for providing livelihood solutions to contribute to the betterment of the community and I am sure my oil will provide a better solution for grey hair in comparison to dyes available that are having side effects but still are required to be used in every 15 days. I am myself suffering from the same issue so I could better connect with the problem and finding solutions.
Inkpothub: What is the process of patent? And why it is needed for your research work?
Ms. Piyusha: Basically I am a Ph.D. scholar and working on my research project from the past 2 years. I am doing my Ph.D. under faculty of entrepreneurship and start-up and filing for a patent is a prerequisite of award of the degree.
Inkpothub: What are the industry implications of your research?
Ms. Piyusha: The developed formulation after getting patented can be worked upon to scale up for commercial production. It can be produced on a commercial level and introduced into the market as a unique pure herbal solution for grey hair.
Inkpothub: Where do you see yourself 5 years from now?
Ms. Piyusha: I see myself as a successful researcher and an entrepreneur providing a range of more herbal solutions for various health and beauty related issues.
Inkpothub: A research supervisor is for emotional support. What are your views on it?
Ms. Piyusha: The most important aspect of good result-oriented research is a good supervisor. Due to multitasking including research, job, and other responsibilities, it might alleviate the adverse effects. Time pressure and occupational stress usually force people to quit research. In this scenario to still maintain positivity, one requires emotional counseling and supportive supervision. In order to provide these supervisors shall have the element of noticing that the student is in need of emotional support as at various moments students may fail to explain, discuss or even speak about it but this might affect adversely on performance and cause stress. From my personal experience, I can endorse that supervisor support can influence the work output in a positive manner and improves the researcher’s result by presenting a significant relationship between supervisor support and researcher. My supervisor not only guided me for my work, she always motivated me to keep on going and taught me how to overcome problems, focus and search for solutions. She always supported me emotionally which helped me to concentrate and the final outcome and strengthened me to work with positivity in adverse conditions. She encouraged me and taught me to realize my inner strength and how to always stretch my boundaries of limitation outward to create space for myself to become successful and work with positivity. Her limitless and unconditional emotional support always gave me the strength to get going and achieve my goals.
