Team
Dr Faisal Khan,
Dr Faisal Khan is Assistant Professor and Director at the Institute of Integrative Biosciences (IIB), at CECOS University, Peshawar. IIB is a first of its kind cross-disciplinary institute that aims to lead translational and applied research especially in the area of biotechnology in Pakistan. As a biologist, in search of impact on the ground, Dr Khan is leading pioneering efforts in the area of synthetic biology, bio-entrepreneurship and bioeconomy in Pakistan.
He has successfully lead ‘SynBioKP’ the PKR 12.5 million project funded by the Government of KP for the promotion and propagation of synthetic biology in the province. The project has now been renewed for another 3 years with a total worth of PKR 300 million. Dr Khan is also the founding Director of the IMSciences-CECOS Joint Centre for Bioeconomy.
Dr Khan is a graduate of the University of Oxford, where he completed his doctoral studies at the intersection of Cell Biology and Systems Biology as a member of the Oxford Protein Informatics Group. His project involved integrating biological data and using machine-learning techniques to predict genes, which function in specific biological processes including cancer. His work unraveled 26 novel genes with a role in mitosis and potentially cancer. His research group at IIB is now using the same methods to also investigate important infectious diseases in Pakistan, including Dengue Fever, Hepatitis, Malaria and Tuberculosis.
During the course of his DPhil, Faisal was also a SIP scholar at the Saïd Business School where he read Strategy and Innovation. Faisal also has an MSc in Integrative Bioscience from the University of Oxford with two dissertations in Cell Biology and Structural Bioinformatics.
Throughout his career Faisal has won numerous awards and scholarships including the HEC overseas scholarship, the Oxford-Noon Award and the St. Anne’s College Domus Award. As an entrepreneur, Faisal was selected amongst Europe’s 40 Biotech Leaders of the Future by Novartis in 2009 and his startup won his team the CUE Grand Finale, the largest business plan competition at the University of Cambridge, in 2011. Faisal was also awarded the Youth Development Leader Award in 2016, by the Ministry of Planning, Development and Reforms, Government of Pakistan.
Dr Khan is also a member of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa IT Board, the KP Directorate of Science and Technology Advisory Committee and the KP Higher Education Research Endowment Fund and is the focal person of the Federal Ministry of Climate Change for Synthetic Biology at the UN Convention on Biological Diversity.
Address: CECOS University, Phase 6, Hayatabad, Peshawar, Pakistan
Phone: +92-91-5860291-3; Ext. 144
Email: faisal@cecos.edu.pk
Dr Muhammad Rafiq,
Joint Director
Dr Rafiq is Associate Professor at the Institute of Management Sciences, Peshawar, Pakistan. He is a PhD in Economics with a teaching career that is spread over twenty years. He has taught a number of applied and theoretical economic courses including Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, Environmental Economics and Econometrics.
Dr Rafiq has attended a number of courses offered in the field of Environmental and Resource Economics these include Environmental Economics (EE) Course in Colombo jointly organized by SANDEE & WBI, a course on Science, Economics, and Institutions for Managing Payment for Ecosystems Jointly organized by EEPSEA, SANDEE, and World Agro forestry Institute held at Chiang Mai, Thailand. He has also done a course on Econometrics organized by SANDEE at Dulikel, Nepal. Moreover, the course on Environmental Economics for Development Policy held by The World Bank Institute and Asian Development Bank at Bangkok, Thailand the Climate Science and Policy Workshop organized by SANDEE, held at Bangkok.
Dr Rafiq has worked on a number of research projects. In areas including Macro Economics, Labor Economics; Environmental & Resource Economics, Public Finance, Institutional Economics and Development sector studies. He has worked with WWF-Pakistan SANDEE, TAF, WHO, UNICEF, UNDP and HEC as a consultant and researcher. He has designed a PES Scheme for the Cotton Grower in Sindh and has also worked on two HEC funded EE projects worth PKR 9 Million PKR and many other studies related to tourism, poverty, Labor Market issues, health, urbanization and environment. Presently, Dr Rafiq is working on an assignment of ERKF/WB to develop an investment strategy for KPBOIT.
Currently Dr Rafiq is the head of the Graduate Economics Program at the IMSciences and the Joint Director of the Joint Centre for Bioeconomy. Dr Rafiq is the author of 29 journal publications mostly in the field of environmental and development economics.
Address: IMSciences, Phase 7, Hayatabad, Peshawar, Pakistan
Phone: +92-91-9217451-52
Email: muhammad.rafiq@imsciences.edu.pk