Professor Yadav's research focusses on capturing and utilising naturally occurring genetic variations present in crops germplasm for 'public good' outcomes. To realise such interests he collaborates  across the globe with academics, industry partners and ‘not for profit’ inter-governmental organisations, and is passionate about pursuing international development goals via sustainable agricultural development. His work has delivered unique genetic resources, and advanced genetic technologies, that are delivering crops varieties (and their products) providing enhanced food, nutritional, environmental and health security at global scale. 

Professor Yadav is a prolific writer and has published over 155 research articles so far. He is an academic editor of PLOS ONE since 2014. 

Professor Yadav has been, and is currently, a member of several grant awarding panels within the UK (e.g., BBSRC, British Council, DEFRA, DFID, Innovate UK) and abroad (European Commission, Swedish Council for Sustainable Development (known as Formas) and Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR)). Earlier, he was a panel member of UK’s Research Excellence Framework (REF 2021) sub panel 6: Agriculture, Food and Veterinary sciences) concluded in 2022. In 2020, he also led a team that evaluated both the quality of science as well as impacts generated by global CGIAR Research Programme (CRP) on rice agri-food system (RICE) hosted by IRRI (https://www.irri.org). 

Professor Yadav is a staunch advocate of achieving sustainable development goals through sustainable agriculture promoting food security, improved nutrition, and environmentally friendly farming practices. 

Dr Rattan Yadav is a professor of plant genetics and holds a personal chair at the Institute of Biological, Environmental and Rural Sciences (IBERS) of the Aberystwyth University. An elected Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales (FLSW), he received his DPhil degree from the University of Sussex and subsequently undertook post-doctoral research at International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in Philippines before coming to Aberystwyth in 1996. Professor Yadav is also a visiting VAJRA faculty (https://dst.gov.in/vajra) at CCSHAU, Hisar, India, currently.