Laboratory where he worked on Rice genome sequencing, genome sequence finishing and genome analysis. Sharma resides in the Executive Director's Residence in NABI Campus at Knowledge City in Mohali, Punjab. Legacy Sharma's research has been focusing the fields of genomics and plant disease resistance and he has worked on the crop improvement of rice. His work on rice blast disease caused by Magnaporthe oryzae fungus led to the identification of Pi54 (Pi-kh) gene which showed resistance to the disease and he was successful in cloning the gene from Indica Rice Line Tetep using positional cloning technique. He developed new DNA markers namely SSR, STMS and SNP and isolated Pi54rh and Pi54of, two new alleles, from wild rice which showed resistance to Magnaporthe oryzae. Working on the sheath blight disease of rice caused by Rhizoctonia solani, the team led by him mapped a new gene, QTL qSBR11-1, which helped in the development of disease resistant rice varieties such as Pusa Basmati 1637 and HPR 2880. The development of a new cloning protocol for Avr-Pi54 gene from Magnaporthe oryzae as well as sequencing techniques of genes of rice, tomato, pigeon pea, Magnaporthe, and Puccinia were some of his other contributions. His studies have been documented by way of a number of articles and ResearchGate, an online repository of scientific articles has listed 77 of them. He also holds six Indian patents for the processes he has developed. Sharma is the chief editor of the Journal of Plant Biochemistry and Biotechnology of Springer Media and sits in the editorial board of the Biotech Today journal. He is a life member of several scientific societies including the Biotechnology Society of India, the Society for Plant Biochemistry and Biotechnology, the Association for the Promotion of DNA Fingerprinting and other DNA Technologies (APDFDT) and the Indian Phytopathological Society. Besides, he has mentored many post-graduate and doctoral research scholars in their studies and has delivered plenary or invited speeches at seminars which included the lecture on a lecture on ‘Cloning and Characterization of Genes and their Application in Rice Improvements - A Success Story, delivered as a part of the NAAS lecture series at Punjab Agricultural University campus on 1 March 2017. Awards and honors Sharma received the Young Scientist Award of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences in 1998 and the Young Scientist Award of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research the next year. In 2001,