Before Joining LSHTM, I used to work on developing a chemically conjugate vaccine against Salmonella typhi at the Egyptian company for production of vaccines, sera and drugs, Cairo, Egypt. I wondered back then about whether there is any enzyme that can catalyse the complex chemical reactions one has to do in order to chemically link a glycan to protein. This is when I came across the work from Wren's laboratory. I then joined the Wren Lab as a research assistant to develop glycoengineering tools, specifically against Streptococcous pneumonaie.
I enjoyed working on this project to the extent that I decided to pursue my PhD in glycobiology however, this time I set a more difficult challenge. I decided to investigate the role of bacterial N-glycoyslation. The work from my PhD led to key publications in the field. After I finished my PhD in 2019, I moved back to work on the translational side of glycobiology mainly on vaccines development and production of glycoproteins.
Affiliations
Research
My research interest is divided into two main tracks, basic and applied. Basic biology focuses on understanding the biological role of N-linked glycans and unraveling the function of glycosylation systems in different organisms. Using Campylobacter jejuni, which has one of the most extensively studied glycosylation system in bacteria, to understand the basic functional role of N-linked glycans in bacteria.
Parallel to my basic biology research, I work on biotechnological applications that can be branched from my basic biology research, especially in exploiting bacterial oligosaccharyltransferases and/or glycosyltransferases in developing conjugate vaccines and perhaps humanized glycoproteins.
However, my thirst for understanding orchestrated biological process can never be quenched. So besides my main research I am interested in knowing more about how biological systems function and how could we exploit the molecular machinery in developing of a biomimic/bioinspired tools.