Speaker Bios
Dr. Dhaval Shah
He is an Associate Professor at the University at Buffalo. He received his Ph.D. from the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University at Buffalo; and he was Principal Scientist at Pfizer Inc. before becoming a professor. His research focuses on understanding the determinants for the absorption, distribution, metabolism, and elimination (ADME) of protein therapeutics and novel biologics. His lab uses the principles of Pharmacokinetics-Pharmacodynamics (PK-PD) Modeling & Simulation to support the discovery, clinical translation, and late phase development of novel biologics like engineered antibodies, multi-specific proteins, immuno-oncology agents, engineered T cells, antibody-drug conjugates, and gene delivery vectors.
Dr. Rajiv Nayar
He is Founder and President of HTD Biosystems. Previously, Dr. Nayar was at Bayer where he established the formulation and drug delivery Group in the biotechnology division and was responsible for managing the formulation and drug delivery activities within the global Bayer network on protein/peptide based drugs. He was a recipient of 3 consecutive Presidential Achievement Awards at Bayer for implementing Continuous Improvement Processes in pharmaceutical development. He is the inventor the Bayer’s albumin-free Factor VIII formulation (Kogenate® FS, JiVI). Prior to Bayer, he was at the Canadian Liposome Company and involved in the development of liposomal doxorubicin and vincristine (Caelyx®, Myocet®).
At HTD Biosystems, Rajiv has been involved in over 700 projects on protein formulation, liposomal and LNP drug delivery systems, vaccine development, and establishing novel high throughput technologies for rapid and efficient drug formulation using mg amounts of material and advanced DOE systems (iFormulate™).
He is an inventor on >20 patents and has authored >70 publications. He is a recipient of a recently (Biochemistry) from University of British Columbia and was an MRC fellow at M.D Anderson Tumor Institute.