Dr Shaw's three main interests all fall under the umbrella of asthma research.Firstly the airway and airway epithelium. He has two projects; one examining the role of macrolide antibiotics on the airway epithelium, using epithelial cells cultured from well phenotyped asthma patients and a second looking at distal airway inflammation using a small bronchial brush technique.

Continuing research from his thesis, he is evaluating the role of exhaled nitric oxide in treatment decisions in asthma care and have a funded study in this area.

Finally, he is investigating the role of the small airways in asthma using hyperpolarized xenon MRI imaging in animal models.