Oyekanmi Nashiru, PhD

Regional Director for Africa

After receiving his PhD in molecular genetics in Seoul and completing post-doctoral training at the University of British Colombia, Vancouver and Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, Dr.
Nashiru returned to Nigeria and has since dedicated his career to improving opportunities for young African scientists.

Dr. Nash is currently the deputy-director (Collaboration and Linkages) at the National Biotechnology Development Agency, NABDA/FMST, Abuja, Nigeria, where he doubles as the project manager for a World Bank-facilitated project on biopharmaceutical education, research and development in Nigeria. He is the Program Director for the West African Biotechnology Workshops Series (WABWS). Since 2002, WABWS, in collaboration with institutions in Canada, the USA, the UK and Africa, has run annual capacity building workshops on biotechnology and bioinformatics in Nigeria through which over 300 scientists have been trained. In 2003, Dr. Nashiru received support from the Wellcome Trust and the WHO/TDR for a Symposium on Applied Genomics and Bioinformatics Education and Training in West Africa. A number of the recommendations by experts present at the symposium held in 2003 are now being implemented at the NABDA. Dr. Nashiru co-organized the WHO/TDR-sponsored workshop on “Health-Related Biotechnology in Africa: Ethics, Legal and Social Implications of Development and Transfer” held at Ibadan in April, 2005.

In collaboration with ICAV Africa scientists and laboratories in the USA (David Swayne, SEPRL, USDA and Chris Basler, Mt. Sinai School of Medicine), Dr. Nash and his team provided the first characterization of the avian pathogenesis of African HPAI. Dr. Nashiru organized the First African Workshop/Symposium on Avian and Pandemic Influenza and Anti-Virals (May, 2007, Abuja, Nigeria), which was supported by the Nigerian government, the World Bank, WHO-Afro and ICAV. In collaboration with the South African National Bioinformatics Institute, he organized the WHO-TDR Bioinformatics Strategic Meeting on “Translational Bioinformatics Research in Africa” (April, 2008). More recently, he organized the ICGEB-sponsored workshop on “Protozoan Pathogens Comparative Genomics” at Ibadan, Nigeria (December, 2009), in collaboration with Jessica Kissinger (University of Georgia, Athens) and Raphael Isokpehi (Jackson State University, USA). Dr.Nash is an adjunct lecturer in the University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria..