Tanveer Tabish

Overview

Dr. Tanveer Tabish is a British Heart Foundation Advanced Fellow and a Group Leader within the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine. His research group pioneers drug delivery platforms for cardiovascular therapeutics. Tanveer earned his PhD from the University of Exeter, supported by the UKRI Doctoral Training scholarship where he worked on graphene-based anti-cancer nanomedicine. After a short spell at UCL working on photonanomedicine for the detection of cancer at early, curable and reversible stage funded by the CRUK, he went to Imperial College London developing plasmonic nanomedicines for disease theranostics. In early 2022, he joined the Radcliffe Department of Medicine. 

In a nutshell, our group orchestrates the development of next-generation functional biomaterials by synergising  principles from materials science, chemical biology and biomedical engineering. We specialise in the rational design and chemical functionalisation of avant-garde nanostructures for targeted drug delivery, bioimaging and real-time sensing. A paramount focus lies in fabricating nitric oxide releasing nanomedicines for cardiovascular regeneration, with an emphasis on creating intelligent delivery systems capable of navigating complex biological environments, responding to pathophysiological stimuli and restoring homeostatic function. 

cardiovascular NANOTHERAPEUTICS

The cellular environment exists in a delicate equilibrium between reducing and oxidising conditions, characterised by the lack of oxygen and hydrogen-rich molecules. This redox balance governs crucial processes from metabolic regulation to cellular signaling and its disruption underpins the pathogenesis of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). Nitric oxide (NO), a pivotal redox-active mediator, sits at the heart of this paradigm, modulating vascular homeostasis, mitochondrial function and inflammatory cascades. Yet, its therapeutic potential remains constrained by challenges in spatiotemporal delivery and targeted bioactivity. Our work confronts this unmet clinical challenge through an innovative nanomedicine framework, redefining how NO-based therapeutics are engineered. Our research interrogates how endogenous and exogenous NO can be harnessed to treat and prevent CVDs with unprecedented precision. We develop redox-responsive nanodrug excipients capable of navigating the biochemical gradients of cardiovascular system, using pH-selective permeabilities to guide cargo (e.g., NO-releasing materials and NO donors) to subcellular targets in CVD.

In parallel, we are developing advanced synthetic platforms for the real-time imaging of NO at subcellular resolution, illuminating how NO fluxes relate to mitochondrial dysfunction, oxidative stress and endothelial pathology.

One of our flagship efforts involves the design and fabrication of next-generation cardiovascular implants for controlled, sustained and stimulus-responsive therapeutic action. These innovations are pursued in close collaboration with engineers, chemists, pharmacists and clinicians to bridge the gap between fundamental redox biology and translational cardiovascular therapeutics.

University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

University of California, Los Angeles

University of New South Wales, Australia

Technical University Munich (TUM)

University of Exeter Medical School

University of Glasgow