Dr Nasser Al-Shanti

My profile

Biography

Academic and professional qualifications

  • Fellowship of the Institute of Biomedical Science (FIBMS), 2013

  • PgCAP, Manchester Metropolitan University, 2012

  • PhD In Molecular Immunology, University of Bristol, 2002, UK

  • BSc, in Biomedical Sciences, Al-Quds University, Palestine, 1994

Examiner for PhD

  • Examined 5 PhD students (internal)

  • Examined 2 PhD students (external, Netherlands)

External collaborations:

  • Bristol University (Bristol Heart Institute)

  • Manchester University (Dr Adam Reid, Department of Plastic Surgery & Burns, Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust)

  • Manchester Clinical Neuroscience Centre (Dr Amina Chaouch, Salford Royal, )

  • Danone Nutricia (Utrecht, the Netherlands)

  • Center for research In Myology (Prof. Vincent Mouly), UMRS 974 Sorbonne Université-INSERM 

Impact

Teaching

Supervision

  • I have supervised 15  PhD students to completion (5 as Director of the Study and 10 as first supervisor)

  • I have supervised 25 MSc students (23 bu taught and 2 by research)

  • 1 PhD student in 1st year (completion 2024)

Research outputs

I started my career as an immunologist looking at molecular mechanisms regulating immune cells proliferation and differentiation. After 3 years, I moved to a permanent position at MMU (Department of Life Sciences,) working on muscle stem cells aging and regeneration. As immunologist that sparked my interest in muscle stem cells regeneration and immune system interaction. I started my lab about 15 years ago, and have worked broadly on muscle stem cell regeneration and how that changes with age. I have started using an immune system secretion to promote muscle stem cell regeneration. My research group have established a novel line of research studying the cross-talk between the immune system and skeletal muscle stem cells ageing. More specifically, we are examining how the immune system secretions modulate muscle stem cells niche and regulate muscle stem cell regeneration, and what goes wrong during the ageing process to eventually lead to weakness. To enable us to investigate such interactions, I have developed a novel culture model to enable me to examine the effect of immune system on muscle regeneration. Recently, we have bioengineered a novel functional nerve-muscle co-culture platform to study neuromuscular junctions formation in ageing and diseases. The work that I lead forms the basis of my teaching at MMU, but of course it has also led to high impact scientific publications and presentations.