Alumni Talk series 1.0

The Alumni & Community service committee at the Faculty of Science is organizing throughout the academic year 2022-2023, a series of Alumni talks featuring distinguished BAU Science Alumni from a variety of fields and industries, and showcasing success in its many forms. These talks aim at inspiring the students with success stories, showcasing what’s possible to do with the degree they study and be encouraged to advance their own career.

The first talk in this series was successfully organized online on Friday November 4th through zoom platform and featured a distinguished biochemist Alumna, Dr. Rana Khalifeh, lecturer at University College London (UCL), UK. Dr. Khalifeh earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Biochemistry from the Faculty of Science at Beirut Arab University in 2010 and 2013, respectively. Following her Master’s degree, she got accepted at University College London, UCL, UK and joined the PhD program in biochemical engineering/regenerative medicine in Fall 2013-2014. Dr. Khalifeh is currently appointed as Lecturer in the Department of Biochemical Engineering at UCL, she’s also a Coordinator of the Regenerative Medicine Minor in the Faculty of Engineering and the Admissions Tutor of the MSc program “Commercialization and Manufacture of Cell and Gene Therapies” at UCL, the UK's only university to have a department dedicated to this exciting and world-changing subject.

In her talk entitled “Manufacturing in Regenerative Medicine: Introduction to Biochemical Engineering”, Dr. Khalifeh provided students with insights about her professional career path. She introduced the fundamentals of manufacturing in Regenerative Medicine: using case studies and practical examples of how Biochemical Engineers are helping to develop new cancer treatment and the application of stem cells in cell therapy. Her talk provided an opportunity for students to increase their knowledge on how discoveries could be translated into market and they were able to ask their questions at the end of the event during an interactive Q&A session.