KAM-School of Life Sciences
Extension Number: 556
Office Number: S-327

BRIEF PROFILE
Dr. Muhammad Imran holds a PhD degree in Biomolecular Science from the Faculty of Life Sciences, The University of Manchester, UK. He did a brief post doc with Prof. Jeremey Derrick at The University of Manchester and then joined a multinational company Syngenta as a protein scientist in Bracknell UK. He has nearly 13 years of post-doctoral experience in Research and Teaching.  He has more than 18 research publications in refereed journals with cumulative impact factor of 58.537. He also collaborates within institution as well as with external companies within Pakistan (4 brothers) and in UK (Mologics). He has supervised more than dozen MPhil and currently 3 PhD students are under his supervision (1 as supervisor and 2 as Co-Supervisor).  He is a protein scientist, his research interest include drugs/pesticide design, recombinant enzyme engineerinf and develop traits for the crop plants. He has expertise in recombinant protein expression in plant, yeast, and E. coli systems. He has secured 58.537 million competitive grants from various funding agencies since 2013 at FCCU.

EDUCATION

• PhD in Biomolecular Science from Sir Henry Welcome, Manchester Institute of Biotechnology, The University of Manchester UK.
• MPhil Biotechnology, NIBGE, Quid e Azam University, Islamabad Pakistan
• BSC (Hons) Agriculture University of Agriculture Faisalabad Pakistan

RESEARCH & PUBLICATIONS
The research in this group focuses on the development of herbicide tolerant crops. For this local microbes with novel proteins are isolated and are incorporated into crop plants after necessary modifications. Other projects include expression, purification characterization and assay development for drug targets (such as Urease, Covid-19 N and MPro proteins) and insecticide targets (sterol carrier protein, Acetyl choline binding proteins). The third area of interest is recombinant enzymes production using Pichia pastoris stains. These strains are transformed for hyper expression of AChBP and Phytase and other industrially important enzymes. Expression is optimized on local feed stock at shake flask and lab fermenter level. A modest protein production facility including (Shakers, centrifuges, FPLC, sonicator, peristaltic pump and protein purification columns, electrophoresis system etc) is available for this work.

1. Saghir Ahmad, Muhammad Abdul Qadir, Mahmood Ahmed, Muhammad Imran , Muhammad Ahmad, Numan Yousaf, Tanveer A. Wani, Seema Zargar, Ijaz Ali, Muhammad Muddassar. (2023) Exploring the Potential of New Benzamide-Acetamide Pharmacophore Containing Sulfonamide as Urease Inhibitors: Structure–Activity Relationship, Kinetics Mechanism, and In Silico Studies. ACS Omega. https://doi.org/10.1021/acsomega.3c07275 4.132 (W)
2. Saghir Ahmad, Muhammad Abdul Qadir, Mahmood Ahmed, Muhammad Imran , Numan Yousaf, Asnuzilawati Asari, Abdul Hameed, Muhammad Muddassar. (2023) Acetylsalicylic acid-sulfa drugs conjugates as potential urease inhibitors and anti-inflammatory agents: bio-oriented drug synthesis, molecular docking, and dynamics simulation studies. Journal of Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics. 5.235 (W)
3. Saghir Ahmad, Muhammad Abdul Qadir, Mahmood Ahmed, Muhammad Imran , Numan Yousaf, Tanveer A. Wani, Seema Zargar, Ijaz Ali, Muhammad Muddassar (2023) New Acetamide-Sulfonamide-Containing Scaffolds: Antiurease Activity Screening, Structure-Activity Relationship, Kinetics Mechanism, Molecular Docking, and MD Simulation Studies. Molecules. 4.927 (W)
4. Saghir Ahmad, Muhammad Abdul Qadir, Muhammad Imran, Numan Yousaf, Tanveer A. Wani, Seema Zargar, Ijaz Ali, Muhammad Muddassar (2023) Exploring the potential of propanamide-sulfonamide based drug conjugates as dual inhibitors of urease and cyclooxygenase-2: Biological and their in silico studies. Frontiers in Chemistry. 5.545 (W)
5. Numan Yousaf, Yaruq Jabeen, Muhammad Imran, Muhammad Saleem, Moazur Rahman, Abbas Maqbool, Mazhar Iqbal, Muhammad Muddassar (2023) Exploiting the co-crystal ligands shape features and structure-based approaches for identification of SARS-Cov-2 Mpro inhibitors. Journal of biomolecular structure and dynamics. Journal of Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics. 4.115 (W)
6. Saeed Q, Ahmad F, Yousaf N, Ali H, Tirmazi SAAS, Alshammari A, Kausar N, Ahmed M,
   Imran M, Jamshed M, Alharbi M, Muddassar M.* (2022) In-silico and in-vivo evaluation of synthesized SCP-2 inhibiting compounds on life table parameters of Helicoverpa armigera (Hübner). Insects. 3.141 (W)
7. Saeed A, Rafiq Z, Imran M, Saeed Q, Saeed MQ, Ali Z, Iqbal RK, Hussain S, Khaliq B, Mehmood S and Akrem A. (2022) “In-silico studies calculated a new chitin oligomer binding site inside vicilin: a potent antifungal and insecticidal agent” Dose-Response; DOI: 10.1177/15593258221108280 2.65 (X)
8. Yaqoob S, Hameed A, Ahmed M, Imran M, Qadir MA, Ramzan M, Yousaf N, Iqbal J, Muddassar M. (2022) Antiurease screening of alkyl chain linked thiourea derivatives: In vitro biological activities, molecular docking and dynamic simulations studies. RSC Adv., 12, 6292-6302 4.21 (W)
9. Tirmazi SAAS, Qadir MA, Ahmed Mehmood, Imran M, Hussain R, Sharif M, Yousaf M, Muddassar M. (2021) Levofloxacin and sulfa drugs linked via Schiff bases: Exploring their urease inhibition, enzyme kinetics and in silico studies. Journal of Molecular Structure. . 2.463 (W)
10. Imran M, Waqar S, Ogata K, Ahmed M, Noreen Z, Javed S, Bibi N, Bokhari H, Amjad A, Muddassar M. (2020) Identification of novel bacterial urease inhibitors through molecular shape and structure based virtual screening approaches. RCS Advances. . 3.049* (W)
11. Mehmood S, Imran M, Ali A, Munawar A, Khaliq B, Anwar F, Saeed Q, Buck F, Hussain S, Saeed A, Ashraf MY, Akrem A. (2020). Model prediction of a Kunitz-type trypsin inhibitor protein from seeds of Acacia nilotica L. with strong antimicrobial and insecticidal activity. Turkish Journal of Biology. doi:10.3906/biy-2002-20. 0.716 (X)
12. Ahmed M, Imran M, Muddassar M, Hussain R, Khan MU, Ahmad S, Mehboob MY, Ashfaq S. (2020). Benzenesulfonohydrazides inhibiting urease: Design, synthesis, their in vitro and in silico studies. Journal of Molecular Structure. . 2.463 (W)
13. Sultan M, Javeed A, Uroos M, Imran M, Jubeen F, Nouren S, Saleem N, Bibi I, Masood R & Ahmed W. (2018) Linear and crosslinked Polyurethanes based catalysts for reduction of Methylene Blue. Journal of Hazardous Materials. 6.065 (W)
14. Ahmed M, Qadir MA, Hameed A, Imran M, Muddassar M. (2018) Screening of curcumin-derived isoxazole, pyrazoles, and pyrimidines for their anti-inflammatory, antinociceptive, and cyclooxygenase-2 inhibition. Chem Biol Drug Des. 00:16. . 2.485 (X)
15. Ullah R, Shah MA, Tufail S, Ismat F, Imran M, Iqbal M, Mirza O and Moazur Rhaman. (2016) Activity of the Human Rhinovirus 3C Protease Studied in Various Buffers, Additives and Detergents Solutions for Recombinant Protein Production. PLoS ONE 11(4): e0153436. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0153436. 3.234 (W)
16. Saleem M, Prince SM, Rigby S, Imran M, Sanders H, Patel H, Chan H, Feavers IM & Derrick JP. (2012) Use of a molecular decoy to segregate transport from antigenicity in the FrpB iron transpoter from Neisseria meningitides PLoS ONE 8(2): e56746. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0056746. 3.534 (W)
17. Tehseen M, Imran M, Ali S, Hussain M, Mansoor S & Zafar Y. (2010) Development of male sterility by silencing Bcp1 gene of Arabidopsis through RNA interference. A.J.Biotechnology 9(19): 2736-2741. Journal ISSN: 1684-5315. 0.573 (Y?)
18. Khan MA, Zulkiffal, M, Imran M, & Rahman AU. (2004) Evaluation of planting time and seeding rate in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) Journal of Agricultural Research 42(2):163-169. (Y)