Computational & Experimental Drug Discovery for Cancer and Infectious Disease
Focus
Mechanism-first insights
From molecular structures to actionable hypotheses and experimental priorities.
Tools
Reproducible pipelines
Standardized computational workflows paired with wet-lab validation where feasible.
Collaboration
Student supervision
Self-funded and/or government-funded students are welcome for aligned projects.
Education Profile
- King Abdulaziz University (KAU) — Assistant Professor (Current)
- University of Cambridge — Postdoc (2022–2024)
- University of Cambridge — Ph.D (2022)
- University of Nottingham — MSc (2015)
- Queen Mary University of London — BSc (2014)
Profile
Ali is an assistant professor at King Abdulaziz University. He completed his undergraduate studies in Pharmaceutical Chemistry at Queen Mary University of London in 2014. Subsequently, he pursued a master's degree in Drug Discovery Pharmaceutical Science at the University of Nottingham in 2015. In 2018, he returned to the United Kingdom to commence his doctoral studies under the guidance of Prof. Sir Tom Blundell at the University of Cambridge, based in the Department of Biochemistry at the Sanger Institute. During his doctoral tenure, his research primarily centered on Computational and Experimental Drug Discovery in Cancer and SARS-CoV-2. Following the completion of his PhD in 2022, he continued his academic journey as a Postdoctoral Researcher under Prof. Blundell's mentorship, specializing in Drug Discovery for infectious diseases, particularly Mycobacterium abscessus.
Research
Research interests
- Structural Biology: drug targets and protein 3D structures using Cryo-EM and X-ray crystallography
- Medicinal Chemistry: synthesis of small molecules to improve ligand–target potency
- Bioinformatics: tools, databases, and pipelines for aging, cancer, and infectious disease
Research summary
Structure-based drug discovery is a multidisciplinary approach that merges structural biology, medicinal chemistry, and bioinformatics to design therapeutics. By decoding biomolecular 3D structures, identifying candidate targets, and designing compounds with improved efficacy and specificity, the work iterates between computational forecasts and experimental validation.
Publications
For the latest list, please see: Google Scholar
Supervision
Current PhD opportunities
Please send your CV to: afmalsulami1@kau.edu.sa
Current Student
- Abdulelah Abdullah Alanazi (master student)
- Nawaf Faris AlJuhani (master student)