Dr Farid Khan
Dr Khan is a serial biotech entrepreneur, having obtained his PhD at Peterhouse in Protein Engineering (2000-2004) and previously worked for GlaxoSmithKline in drug discovery. He worked at The Babraham Institute in DNA and Protein microarrays (2004-06), and as PI on molecular diagnostics at The University of Manchester (2006-10).
Dr. Khan has developed technologies and therapies for diseases in the developed and the developing world. In 2010, he founded his first biotech, Protein Technologies which developed novel biologics, biostimulants from microalgae, and industrial biocatalysts. In 2012-2024, Dr. Khan founded PharmaKure Ltd-a spin out from The University of Manchester which was working on precision-based medicines using machine learning models for CNS diseases’ combining blood-based biomarkers with drugs.
He founded Pill Connect Ltd, a med-tech company which measures medication adherence using a Bluetooth electronic pill dispenser- which is being trialed and obtained Series A funding from VCs. Dr. Khan is also the co-founder of Bright Biotech, which focuses on recombinant production of growth factors in plants. He has secured £multi-million funds from private and public sources, formed key interdisciplinary collaborations with industry, academic institutions and charities (such as the Welcome Trust) including stakeholders in the UK's healthcare agenda.
In 2013, Dr. Khan was awarded an Alumni Achievement Award from the University of Salford, in recognition of his work in science and engineering and in 2014, he was awarded the Fazlur Rahman Khan award for excellence in engineering/science/technology by Prime Minister David Cameron. Dr. Khan has been interviewed by Bloomberg, The Guardian and the BBC and in a number of peer reviewed journals. In 2019, Dr. Khan formed Chief AI, a company focused on finding repurposed drugs using AI which has received InnovateUK and seed funding. In June, 2019, Dr. Khan was included in the top 100 Asian Stars in UK Tech-a definitive list by Diversity UK in association with KPMG and in 2024 he was awarded Tech star Pioneer by Asians in Tech.
Currently, my primary interests are in mentoring founders and scaling up biotech startups in the areas of drug development, genetic engineering, and diagnostics. I am applying machine learning in these technologies to accelerate further applications in The Life Sciences.
Rodriguez L. H, Meyer H-P, Karen T. Robins K.T., Khan F. (2012) Perspectives on biotechnological halogenation Part II: Prospecting for future biohalogenases chimica oggi/Chemistry Today, Jan..
Wong L. S.; Khan F., Micklefield J. (2009) Selective covalent protein immobilization: strategies and applications. Chemical reviews;109 9 4025-53.
Tasdemir, A, Khan, F, Jowitt, T.A, L, Lohmer, S, Corazza, S, Schmidt, T.J.(2008) Monomeric design of a tetrameric fluorescent protein AsGFP499 by protein engineering and its application in a dual translocation and transcription assay. Protein Engineering, Design and Selection, 21 613-22
M. He, O. Stoevesandt, E. A. Palmer, F. Khan, O. Ericsson, M. J. Taussig. (2008) Printing protein arrays from DNA arrays. Nature Methods 5 175-177
Khan F., He M. and Taussig M. J. (2006) Double-hexahistidine tag with high affinity binding for protein immobilisation, purification and detection on Ni-Nitrolotriacetic Acid surfaces, Analytical Chemistry (2006) 1;78(9):3072-9.
Steinhauer C., Wingren C., Khan F., He M., Taussig M.J and Borrebaeck, C. (2006) Improved affinity coupling for antibody microarrays: Engineering of double-(His)6-tagged single framework recombinant antibody fragments Proteomics 6:4227-34..
Khan F, Kuprov I, Craggs TD, Hore P, Jackson SE (2006) 19F-NMR studies on the native and denatured states of green fluorescent protein Journal of American Chemical Society, 128, 10729-10737 9 10729
He M. and Khan F. (2005) Ribosome Display: Next generation of display technologies for production of antibodies in vitro .Expert Review in Proteomics 2(3):421-30.
Matthews, H., Usman-Idris, M., Khan, F., Read, M., Nirmalan, N.J. (2013). Drug repositioning as a route to anti-malarial drug discovery: preliminary investigation of the in vitro anti-malarial efficacy of emetine dihydrochloride hydrate. Malaria Journal (12), p359-370.
Book Chapter 6 by F. Khan in Rare Diseases: Challenges and Opportunities for Social Entrepreneurs. Edited by Nicolas Sireau, 2013 (ISBN 978-1-906093-52-5)
