Biography:
Dr. Nassiri is a former Associate Dean of Global Health at the Michigan State University (MSU). He also served as MSU director of Institute of International Health. He is currently Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Professor of Family and Community Medicine, and, lecturer in Global Health, Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine. He currently works on international public health issues relating to chronic diseases and has expertise in global health. He has made contributions in various fields of medical sciences including clinical investigation and health education. On the basis of his extensive experience and expertise in chronic infectious diseases including HIV/AIDS, TB as well as antimicrobial resistance and human gut microbiome, he developed clinical research programs in Brazil, South Africa, Haiti, Dominican Republic and Mexico. He had served as editorial board member for the journal of HIV and AIDS Review. He is currently on editorial board member for AIDS Patient Care and STDs. Prof. Nassiri has delivered seminar presentations on Tropical Medicine, HIV/AIDS, TB, Global Health and public health interventions in numerous national and international conferences and workshops. He is internationally recognized for his work in the areas of building effective international partnerships particularly in global health, community health, clinical care capacity building, and technical assistance mechanism. He is the founder of Michigan State University Osteopathic and Primary Health Clinic in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico. He has developed academic and research partnership programs with Federal University of Para Institute of Tropical Medicine in Belem, Brazil.
Abstract:
The research and clinical interests for microbiota formerly called “the normal flora”, has grown tremendously in the recent years. The large-scale dynamics of the microbiome can be described by many of the tools and observations used in the study and management of chronic disorders. Microbiome and metagenome have important functions in health and disease – their exploration is continuous to better understand human health and genetics, especially the announcement made by the U.S. National Microbiome Initiative. It is now understood that complex microbial communities can influence the pathology chronic diseases, which may have implications for disease diagnosis, management, and prognosis. Currently, studies focus on investigations of variant microbiome communities such as cutaneous, gastric, colonic/colorectal, inflammatory bowel diseases, obesity and metabolic disease just to list few. The key in application of microbiome in chronic disorders is the microbial restoration, which is an appropriate extension of the probiotic strategy – the microbial transplantation has received much interests in the recent years aiming at generating intact microbial community in a diseased person. C. difficile recurrent infections and microbial restoration is a remarkable example of the application of microbial transplantation. Therefore, it appears the future of microbiome therapeutic modalities is a targeted approach which may become embedded in the precision management chronic disorders. Such an approach relies on host factors that may influence the overall individual health as well as response to treatment modalities (e.g., microbial restoration). However, another key factor to such a response is host genetics. Advances in technology especially in nucleic acid sequencing and cultured based microbiology has helped the scientific community to better examine the new roles of microbes in both health and diseases. In summary, advances in microbial phenotyping and metabolic profiling provides a new insight for developing novel therapies for chronic disease conditions. Application of the plantation of microbiome communities may also help to prevent a range of chronic disorders.