Dr. Abdella M Habib was appointed as an Assistant Professor of Biochemistry at the College of Medicine (CMED) at QU in 2017; and is also a visiting researcher/lecturer in Metabolism and Experimental Therapeutics at University College London, U.K.
Before joining CMED, he undertook post-doctoral training at the University of Cambridge and University College London and post-graduate training at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, USA. He holds a Ph.D. in Clinical Biochemistry from the University of Cambridge and a bachelor’s degree from Imperial College London, U.K.
His research activities relate primarily to the nutrient-sensing endocrine cells in the intestine and the genetics of damage-sensing neurons, particularly in the context of pain, diabetes, appetite regulation, critical illness, and aging.
Dr Habib has co-authored in top-tier scientific journals including Nature Medicine, Cell Metabolism and Brain, with more than 7400 citations to date (source: Google Scholar).
His most recent research, which was published in the neurology journals Brain (2023 and 2018) and the British Journal of Anaesthesia (2019), result from work studying families with rare Mendelian pain disorders in which two novel pain insensitivity genes were discovered, ZFHX2 and FAAH-OUT. These discoveries attracted worldwide media attention, including being featured in The New York Times, BBC and Aljazeer. He aims to translate the identification of novel drug targets into therapies for obesity and chronic pain disorders.
