King Abdullah University of Science and Technology

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Niveen M. Khashab 

Professor, Chemistry
Chair, Chemistry Program

Physical Science and Engineering Division 
Center membership :
Advanced Membranes and Porous Materials


Smart Hybrid Materials (SHMs)

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Affiliations

Education Profile

  • ​​​​​Ph.D. University of Florida, 2006
  • B.S. American University of Beirut, 2002

Research Interests

Inspired by the model of evolutionary biological systems, the Khashab research group is engaged in the design and synthesis of supramolecular assemblies at the nanoscale employing non-covalent and coordination interactions. The main advantage of these molecularly defined entities is superior solution processability to be easily and reproducibly integrated in future commercial fabrication processes. These systems are designed with an emphasis on hierarchical-assembly (evolution), porosity (ordered self-assembly) and stimuli-responsiveness (smart materials).

1- Bioengineering/Biomedical Thrust
 
Supramolecular assembled capsules (SACs) are designed to aid in the problem of intracellular delivery by improving targetability and controlling the release of cargo, such as CRISPR-Cas9 and RNA, on-demand. Solving the problem of delivery will not solely drastically improve the quality of therapeutic approaches such as chemotherapy but will also revolutionize the vaccination industry by designing “personalized vaccines or personalized medicine” that protect individuals from various diseases. Moreover, with the decoding of the human genome and the major strides that we see today towards Digital Health, the ability to synthetically mimic a natural function is an inevitable evolutionary step as precise data points will be available to better perfect synthetic designs.
 
2- Industrial Separations and Nanocomposites Thrust
 
 Intrinsically porous materials (IPMs) are a promising alternative to zeolites, covalent organic frameworks (COFs) and porous coordination polymers (PCPs) as sorbents for energy intensive separations as they are made from discrete organic molecules with accessible “built-in” pores or windows. These stable systems are easily prepared and scaled-up in addition to being solution processable, which makes them very attractive for industrial translation. IPMs can be employed using liquid-liquid extraction mechanisms without the need for extensive distillations, which can be directly translated into industrial commodities for CO2 and benzene isomers separation. This will ultimately promote environmentally friendly and energy-efficient industrial separations and can effectively contribute the Circular Carbon Initiative (CCI).

Selected Publications

  • Dey, Avishek; Chand, Santanu; Maity, Bholanath; Bhatt, Prashant M.; Ghosh, Munmun; Cavallo, Luigi; Eddaoudi, Mohamed; Khashab, Niveen M. Adsorptive Molecular Sieving of Styrene over Ethylbenzene by Trianglimine Crystals
    Journal of the American Chemical Society (2021), 143(11), 4090-4094
  • Alsaiari, Shahad K.; Qutub, Somayah S.; Sun, Shichao; Baslyman, Walaa; Aldehaiman, Mansour; Alyami, Mram; Almalik, Abdulaziz; Halwani, Rabih; Merzaban, Jasmeen; Mao, Zhengwei; Khashab, Niveen M. Sustained and targeted delivery of checkpoint inhibitors by metal-organic frameworks for cancer immunotherapy
    Science Advances (2021), 7(4), eabe7174.
  • Alimi, Lukman O.; Alyami, Mram Z.; Chand, Santanu; Baslyman, Walaa; Khashab, Niveen M. Coordination-based self-assembled capsules (SACs) for protein, CRISPR-Cas9, DNA and RNA delivery
    Chemical Science (2021), 12(7), 2329-2344.
  • Zhang, Gengwu; Hua, Bin; Dey, Avishek; Ghosh, Munmun; Moosa, Basem A.; Khashab, Niveen M. Intrinsically Porous Molecular Materials (IPMs) for Natural Gas and Benzene Derivatives Separations
    Accounts of Chemical Research (2021), 54(1), 155-168.
  • Moosa, Basem; Alimi, Lukman O.; Shkurenko, Aleksander; Fakim, Aliyah; Bhatt, Prashant M.; Zhang, Gengwu; Eddaoudi, Mohamed; Khashab, Niveen M. A Polymorphic Azobenzene Cage for Energy-Efficient and Highly Selective p-Xylene Separation
    Angewandte Chemie, International Edition (2020), 59(48), 21367-21371.
  • Dey, Avishek; Chand, Santanu; Alimi, Lukman O.; Ghosh, Munmun; Cavallo, Luigi; Khashab, Niveen M. From Capsule to Helix: Guest-Induced Superstructures of Chiral Macrocycle Crystals
    Journal of the American Chemical Society (2020), 142(37), 15823-15829.
  • Zhang, Gengwu; Emwas, Abdul-Hamid; Shahul Hameed, Umar F.; Arold, Stefan T.; Yang, Peng; Chen, Aiping; Xiang, Jun-Feng; Khashab, Niveen M. Shape-Induced Selective Separation of Ortho-substituted Benzene Isomers Enabled by Cucurbit[7]uril Host Macrocycles
    Chem (2020), 6(5), 1082-1096.