REPORT: MyCRS 1st Drug Delivery Seminar Series 2019 –USM PENANG

The MyCRS drug delivery seminar series of 2019 has officially kicked off! The first seminar series was successfully held on 14 January 2019 at School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang. The theme of the seminar was ‘The next frontier of drug delivery: where are we now?’. The seminar was attended by 34 participants, with mainly postgraduate students and academia as well as representatives from the pharmaceutical industry.

The seminar began with an opening speech by the President of MyCRS, Assoc. Prof. Dr Ng Shiow Fern. She expressed her thank to the co-organiser, Malaysia Society of Pharmaceutical Technology, the sponsor (Prima Nexus) as well as the attendees. She also highlighted the current activities going on within MyCRS as well as the CRS central, particularly in promoting the upcoming annual CRS conference 2019 in Spain.

The first invited speaker was Assoc. Prof. Arlene McDowell from University of Otago, who is also a fellow member of the New Zealand Local Chapter of the Controlled Release Society (NZCRS). She presented her talk via Zoom entitled “Designing nanomedicines decorated with cell penetrating peptides for enhanced cellular uptake. Inviting Dr McDowell to deliver a talk in the seminar series is also one of the initiatives of MyCRS in engaging with other CRS local chapters.

Prof. Yuen Kah Hey from Universiti Sains Malaysia was the second invited speaker and he shared with the participants about the challenges faced by the Malaysian pharmaceutical industry in developing generics.

As part of the effort in promoting Young Drug Delivery Scientist within Malaysia, we had Dr Noratiqah Mohtar, who just returned from her PhD in University of London, School of Pharmacy as the final invited speaker. Dr Noratiqah shared her PhD findings with regards to inhalable cyclodextrin based formulation of a flavonoid.

The poster presenters in this seminar were invited to deliver a 3-minute pitch about their work. There were a total of 8 poster presenters. Dr Zuratul Ain Abdul Hamid from School of Materials & Mineral Resources Engineering, USM received the best pitch award! Congratulations!

The seminar series ended with talk from sponsor (Prima Nexus) and closing remarks from the Presidents of MyCRS and MSPT. The organizing committee thanked all the young scientist participants for their exciting talks and stimulating discussions with the attendees!  

For the photos of this seminar, please click the link below:

http://crsmalaysia.org/the-next-frontier-of-drug-delivery-where-are-we-now/