Mohammad Islam Khan

Mohammad Islam Khan (24 December 1957 – November 2010) was an Indian glycobiologist and a scientist at the National Chemical Laboratory. Known for his studies on the biology of Lectins, Khan was an elected fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, India, Maharashtra Academy of Sciences and the Muslim Association for the Advancement of Science. The Department of Biotechnology of the Government of India awarded him the National Bioscience Award for Career Development, one of the highest Indian science awards, for his contributions to biosciences in 2002.

Biography

Born on the Christmas Eve of 1957, Mohammad Islam Khan obtained an MSc in biotechnology in 1978 and joined the Indian Institute of Chemical Biology (IICB) as a faculty, simultaneously doing his doctoral research at the Indian Institute of Science which earned him a PhD in 1986 from Aligarh Muslim University. Moving to the US, he did his post-doctoral work at Albert Einstein College of Medicine during 1987–90 and on his return to India in 1990, he joined the National Chemical Laboratory (NCL) as a scientist where he spent the rest of his career, barring a stint at the University of Göttingen during 2000–01 as an overseas associate of the Department of Biotechnology. He was holding the post of a scientist at the Division of Biochemical Sciences of NCL when he died in November 2010, aged 53.

Legacy Khan was known for his contributions in the disciplines of glycobiology and nanobiotechnology with special focus on the biology of lectins. The research team under his leadership was successful in isolating a peptide from Streptomyces that showed potency as an inhibitor of Cysteine proteases and the finding is reported to have use in the prophylaxis of cancer by preventing the migration of cancer cells. Towards the latter part of his career, he worked on the synthesis of metal‑metal sulphides/metal oxide nanoparticles using fungi and it was reported that the team synthesized the nano-particles outside a cell for the first time.

Awards and honors The Indian National Science Academy awarded Khan the INSA Young Scientist Medal in 1987. Five years later, he received the 1992 Young Scientist Award of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research. The Department of Biotechnology of the Government of India awarded him the National Bioscience Award for Career Development, one of the highest Indian science awards in 2002. He also received the elected fellowships from three Indian science academies namely, the National Academy of Sciences, India, Muslim Association for the Advancement of Science and Maharashtra Academy of Sciences.

Selected bibliography