Rich Levy Retires; Shanker Gupta to serve as Acting JPST Editor
On March 18, Richard V. Levy, PhD, retired as Editor-in-Chief of the PDA Journal of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology (JPST) after nearly four years as its head. As Editor, Dr. Levy maintained the high quality of JPST submissions, worked to improve the submission and peer-review processes and often added a personal touch, communicating directly with JPST reviewers and authors to facilitate the review and publishing of their manuscripts. Prior to this position, Dr. Levy served as PDA’s Senior Vice President of Scientific and Regulatory Affairs directing and managing the Association’s scientific, technical, regulatory affairs and quality activities. PDA thanks Dr. Levy for his many contributions to the Association.
PDA is pleased to announce that Shanker L. Gupta, PhD, has stepped in to take on the role of Acting Editor-in-Chief, while PDA conducts the search for a permanent Editor. Dr. Gupta has been a member of the Journal Editorial Board since 2019 and a volunteer Associate Editor since 2020, helping evaluate and manage JPST submissions. He has been a PDA member for more than 30 years.
Dr. Gupta has worked with the National Institutes of Health for almost 20 years, currently as a senior scientist in the Division of Cancer Prevention of the National Cancer Institute and consulting with the Vaccine Research Center of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. At NIH, he has been responsible for managing multiple translational projects designed to generate clinical product for use in Phase I and Phase 2 clinical trials. Dr. Gupta also collaborates with contract teams and actively participates in the design and development of formulations of several promising agents that have resulted in patent filings. He has supported over 40 IND submissions.
Richard V. Levy
Shanker L. Gupta
Dr. Gupta has managed projects across different disciplines, including drug discovery, preclinical research, in-vitro/in-vivo efficacy, safety, toxicology, preformulation, formulation development and clinical product manufacture of biologics and small molecules.
Dr. Gupta holds a BS (Hons) in pharmacy from the University of Florida and a PhD in pharmaceutical chemistry from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Prior to joining NIH, he was a project leader in sterile products development at Abbott Laboratories and filed the IND for the expanded use of a lung surfactant product (Survanta®), which was the first product of its kind for neonatal respiratory distress syndrome. Dr. Gupta has published more than 20 papers in various peer-reviewed journals and coauthored a chapter on soft gelatin capsule development in the book Water-Insoluble Drug Formulation.