Islamabad, Higher Education Commission (HEC) scholar Muhammad Arshad has won Best Poster Award during a competition held at the School of Chemistry, University of Bath, England, UK in which 30 postgraduate students participated.

The title of the poster was “Highly Selective Sulfur Ylide Mediated Asymmetric Epoxidations and Aziridinations Using an Inexpensive Chiral Sulfide; Applications to the Synthesis of Quinine and Quinidine.” Quinine is a well-known anti-malarial drug and its synthesis is considered a challenging task.

Arshad, who was pursuing his PhD under Split PhD Program, has returned to Pakistan and is working as Assistant Professor at the Institute of Chemistry, University of the Punjab in Lahore under Interim Placement for Fresh PhDs Program of HEC. Arshad’s field of research is more relevant to the medicinal chemistry and pharmaceutical industry. He has also written two articles in reputed journals of England which have been highlighted as a significant contribution in Chemistry both by Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) and American Chemical Society (ACS) in their monthly magazines. So far, 86 scholars have been awarded scholarship under the scheme, out of which 52 scholars have returned and joined their parent organizations.