������Ƶ

Dr. Andurkar serves as Professor and Chair of the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences. He earned his M.S. and Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry from Auburn University, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences. He completed his postdoctoral studies at the University of Houston, Department of Chemistry. Dr. Andurkar has more than 25 years of experience in the design, synthesis, isolation and purification, structural elucidation, drug metabolism, and pharmacological studies of bioactive molecules. His current research interests are in the design, synthesis, and pharmacological evaluation of novel analgesics and antiepileptic agents, as well as the study of novel synthetic organic chemical methodologies, stereoselective synthesis, and evaluating the impact of stereochemistry on biological activity. He serves as scientific advisor to Aagami Inc., and Pharmazz Inc.

Dr. Spencer Harris is an Infectious Diseases Translational Research Fellow at ������Ƶ College of Pharmacy-Glendale Campus, and he is a member of the Pharmacometrics Center of Excellence. He practices as an Infectious Diseases pharmacist at HonorHealth John C. Lincoln Medical Center in Phoenix, AZ. He obtained his Doctor of Pharmacy in 2022 at the University of Mississippi and completed a PGY-1 Pharmacy Practice Residency at Baptist Memorial Hospital – DeSoto in Southaven, MS. He is engaged in both clinical and in vitro research focusing on Clostridioides difficile and multidrug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii. He serves on multiple organizations’ task forces and committees.

Dr. Medha D. Joshi is an Associate Professor in Pharmaceutical Sciences at ������Ƶ's College of Pharmacy, Glendale Campus. Dr. Joshi has expertise in lipid based drug delivery systems including solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN), micro emulsions, self-emulsifying drug delivery systems (SMEDDs), nanosuspensions, and liposomes etc. targeted drug delivery. Her research program at ������Ƶ university is focused on application of nanoparticulate targeted delivery a) to neurogenetic peptides for their delivery to the blood brain barrier, and b) reduction of maternal-fetal toxicity of drugs across the placental barrier. She has more than 30 peer-reviewed research articles, two patents, and three book chapters to her credit. She has been a principle investigator and co-investigator on several intramural and extramural grants, including the Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation and NIH AREA grants.

Dr. Gwendolyn Pais is a Research Assistant Professor in the College of Pharmacy and a Scientist within the ������Ƶ Pharmacometrics Center of Excellence. Dr. Pais earned her Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She completed her postdoctoral training in Pharmacology at ������Ƶ. Her research focuses on preventing drug-induced kidney and neurologic toxicity. She is particularly interested in defining optimal exposures, exposure thresholds and biomarkers of toxicity to facilitate dose escalation in a safe manner. Her laboratory utilizes non-clinical approaches and seeks to translate these data to critically ill pediatric patients. Dr. Pais is actively engaged in pharmacology organizations and serves as a reviewer for multiple peer-reviewed journals.

Dr. Justin Shiau is an Infectious Diseases Pharmacotherapy fellow at ������Ƶ and a member of the Pharmacometrics Center of Excellence and practices clinically at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. He obtained his Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville School of Pharmacy in 2022. He then went on to complete a PGY-1 Pharmacy Practice Residency at Northwestern Medicine Central DuPage Hospital. Dr. Shiau's interest areas include antimicrobial stewardship, treatment of multi-drug resistant infections, drug-induced toxicity, and pharmacy academia. Currently, he is actively engaged in various activities including clinical data pharmacokinetic modeling of antibiotics and serving in various committees for infectious disease pharmacy organizations.

Dr. Zurawska is a postdoctoral fellow at ������Ƶ in Downers Grove, with a focus on the application of mass spectrometry for the analysis of small molecules in infectious disease research. She obtained her Doctor of Pharmacy degree in Bari, Italy, and gained hand’s on research experience in the laboratory of Prof. Ferdinando Palmieri studying mitochondrial transporter proteins. She received her PhD in Biochemistry and Biophysics in Warsaw, Poland under the supervision of Prof. Michal Dadlez. She has expertise in mass spectrometry-based proteomics to study biomarkers for sensitivity to CDK-4/6 inhibitors in breast cancer, targeted proteomic analyzes, LC-MS PRM, MRM, and global proteomics approaches. She studied the GSTP1 protein which is important in breast cancer at the Division of Oncology at Washington University in St. Louis. Her research interests center on the translational application of mass spectrometry and multi-omics approaches as tools to achieve personalized medicine.