Dr. Naj Sharif is a graduate of Southampton University, England (UK) where he received his BSc (Joint Honors: Biochemistry and Physiology) and his PhD (Neuroscience). Dr. Sharif has been in the pharmaceutical industry for >30-years holding leadership positions of increasing scope and responsibility, spanning Discovery Research, Drug Development and Regulatory Affairs. He has worked at Parke-Davis/Warner-Lambert (Pfizer), Syntex Research (Roche), Alcon-Novartis, and is currently at Santen Inc (Executive Director, R&D Division). Dr. Sharif’s 23-tenure at Alcon resulted in his contributions to the discovery/development and US FDA approvals of Travatan®, Patanol®, Emedine®, Simbrinza®, Izba® and Pazeo® to treat glaucoma/ocular hypertension and ocular allergies. He was recently co-responsible for acquiring Innfocus Inc for Santen, and has thus helped add a device for glaucoma treatment to the product pipeline of Santen. Dr. Sharif was recently elected as a Fellow of ARVO (FARVO), and Fellow of British Pharmacological Society (BPS) (FBPhS) for his exemplary service on numerous committees, progress on drug discovery, and advancement of scientific reputation of both societies. He was honored as the first recipient of the inaugural Dr. Roger Vogel award for pharmaceutical research presented by the ARVO Foundation (2014), and the “Sir James Black Award” for contributions to drug discovery from BPS (2017). He has been an organizer, chairman and invited Keynote speaker at numerous global conferences, symposia and workshops. Dr. Sharif serves on the editorial boards of numerous scientific journals, is an Adjunct Professor at several universities, and a thesis advisor for MS- and PhD-level students. He has published >200 scientific articles and edited 2 books on imaging in neuroscience. Dr. Sharif is also the holder of 23 issued US and EU patents on ocular cell-lines and small drug molecules to treat human diseases of the CNS and the eye.

His research interests span ocular and CNS pharmacology, cellular signal transduction mechanisms, and drug discovery and development.