Sharif holds a PhD degree in Physics Engineering from the University of Coimbra (2014, Portugal), MSc degree in Physics from Al-Quds University (2009, Palestine), and BSc degree in Physics/Mathematics from Birzeit University (2006, Palestine). During the PhD program Sharif worked on developing a PET cyclotron based irradiation setup for proton radiobiology. In 2015 Sharif worked at Birzeit University as an Assistant Professor of Physics for one academic semester. After that, he joined the Medical Applications section at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research, Switzerland) as a Postdoctoral Fellow in February 2016. During the first year at CERN, Sharif contributed significantly to the design and optimization of the experimental beamlines for the BioLEIR study. In 2017, Sharif agreed to act as co-editor for a 180-page CERN yellow report on the BioLEIR feasibility study. As soon as the work on the BioLEIR publication was finished, Sharif pushed for his next project to start – which is a high-level study of optimal Low Energy Beam Transport (LEBT) design.