Dr. Shahzeb Khan

Biography

Shahzeb Khan is currently working as an Assistant Professor in Pharmaceuticals and Cosmetic Sciences  in the Centre for Pharmaceutical Engineering Science (CPES) at the Faculty of Life Science, School of Pharmacy and Medical Sciences.  Shahzeb Khan earned his first degree in Pharmacy (B.Pharmacy) with distinction from Faculty of Pharmacy, Gomal University DI Khan, Pakistan followed by M.Phil leading to  PhD in Molecular Pharmaceutics from the School of Pharmacy University of Bradford in 2012. Dr Khan has 15 years of teaching and research experience in different universities of the world including UK, Pakistan, Malaysia, South Africa, Republic of Ireland and United States. In addition, He has also worked for two years in the Sanofi Aventis as a Production Pharmacist. Dr Khan is the recipient of several prestigious postdoctoral fellowships which include Fulbright Postdoctoral Fellowship, TWAS-NRF, CAS, Marie curie co-fund (PROCESS). He has worked for one year as a Fulbright Postdoctoral Fellow in the College of Pharmacy, University of Texas at Austin USA. He has also worked as a Senior Lecturer in Pharmaceutics at the Faculty of Pharmacy, UiTM Malaysia. He  was also the in-charge of production department of GMP certified Cosmetics unit within the faculty of Pharmacy, UiTM.  During his postdoc at SSPC, University of Limerick Ireland which was funded by SFI, he worked on the development of supercritical Co2 Fluid technology for isolation of drug nanoparticles using the carrier particles.   In 2016, Dr Khan was appointed as an Honorary Research Fellow at the School of Health Sciences, University of Kawa Zulu Natal, Durban South Africa which has recently been renewed up to 2025. Dr Khan has successfully supervised 10 PhD and a number of M.Phil, MS and PharmD dissertations. He has published > 100 research and review articles within the Q1 Journals including  Crystals Growth& Design, Nanomedicine, JCR, Polymers, International Journal of Biological Macromolecules, Pharmaceutics, Colloids and Surfaces B, Cancers, Chemical Engineering  and Angewandte Chemie International. One of the key articles on secondary crystal nucleation published in Angewandte Chemie International with VIP tag which got a tremendous attraction and published by the University of Cambridge in its monthly research News Letter.  Additionally, this work has also been published as a breakthrough by the well known publishers including ScienceDaily, Physics.Org, Europe PMC and Lancaster University. The links are given as below
Crystal clear: Crystal breeding factory uncovered -- ScienceDaily
Secondary Crystal Nucleation: Nuclei Breeding Factory Uncovered. - Abstract - Europe PMC
Crystal clear: crystal breeding factory uncovered | Lancaster University
The Lancaster university also published a press release on  this breakthrough. Dr Khan has secured >3.0million USD research grants both as a PI and Co-PI from different national and international research organisations. Dr Khan has also published many book chapters. He got a good citations and h-index record (citations :2642, h-index :28 )

Research

My primary research focus is to develop, characterize and isolate Smart Nanocrystals of pharmaceutical drug compounds using experimental and molecular simulation approaches. More than 70% of the drug compounds coming through high throughput screening are poor water soluble which result into erratic bioavailability. Among the different approaches including solid dispersion, micronization, micelles, cocrystals, salts, complexation, Nanocrystals have received a noticeable attraction for addressing the issue of poor water-soluble drugs. I have the experience of process optimization of both Top down and Bottom-up technologies for production of stable nanocrystals of pharmaceutical drug compounds with enhanced physicochemical attributes. I have an extensive working experience of using simple and advanced/sophisticated bottom up technologies including solvent and antisolvent approach with syringe pump fitting, microfluidics, Nanoassemblers, SHAPE (superheated aqueous particle engineering), Syringe pump, atomizer hybrid technology and Supercritical CO2 fluid Technology. Furthermore, we have also been working on the top down techniques for producing pharmaceuticals nanocrystals which include, HPH and Wet milling (DENA-DM100).In addition, my research expertise also includes isolation of the drug nanocrystals from nanosuspensions using carrier mediated approach. We have extended this technology for taste masking of bitter antibiotics and development of effective solid pediatric dosage forms.  Supercritical Co2 Fluid technology is an amazing technology which is being employed for engineering of smart therapeutics with enhanced bioavailability attributes. I have worked on the production and isolation of both single and combination drugs nanoparticles using modified supercritical Co2 fluid technology. Professor Kevin Rayan and Dr Luis Padrela lead the supercritical CO2 fluid research group at SSPC, University of Limerick Ireland and I jointly developed with them, the modified ScO2 method for generation and isolation of nanocrystals. I have also an experience of  engineering and characterization of multidrug co-crystals, nanodrug co-crystals and fixed dose multidrug nanocrystals using simple and sophisticated technologies. For molecular level underpinning of the polymers and drug nanocrystals’ interaction, we employ molecular modelling and simulation approaches to rationalize and optimize the suitable stabilizer for stability of nanocrystals. We are also looking at the preparation and characterization of of Folic Acid and amino acid conjugated nanoparticles for targeted drug delivery applications. Furthermore, I am also interested and have the experience of working on Nanogel and nanocrystals loaded hydrogel for different pharmaceutical applications.   We have state of the art labs at CPES (Center for Pharmaceutical Engineering Science)  with all the aforementioned facilities including, Zeta Sizer, Master Sizer, DSC, XRD, SEM, TEM, Spray dryer, freeze dryers, stability chambers, tableting machine, granulators, DVS, HPLC, hot melt extrusion technology, HPH etc. The Prospective PhD students, exchange researchers and postdoctoral researchers, who have the potential funding source with them can directly reach out to me by sending their CVs. I shall be happy to further discuss and help in preparing the joint research proposal for the fellowship opportunities. We have well equipped labs at CPES being led  by the multidisciplinary research team, so the applicants from different research backgrounds including  natural science and health sciences are warmly welcomed to the group.