About M. (Mohsen) Ghanbari, MD, MSc, PhD
Introduction
I am a medical doctor and molecular epidemiologist working as an Associate Professor and Principal investigator (PI) at the department of Epidemiology. I have a multidisciplinary background due to training and working in the clinic, epidemiology and molecular biology fields. As the PI of Molecular and Systems Epidemiology group, I’m currently leading a research group of 3 Postdocs, 5 PhDs and 3 MSc students, teaching in multiple courses offered by the Netherlands Institute for Health Sciences (NIHES), and coordinating ‘omics’ data in the population-based Rotterdam Study (~15,000 individuals) and the Erasmus Rucphen Family study (~3,000 individuals). My research focuses on the identification of genetic determinants and potential biomarkers for complex age-related diseases (e.g. Alzheimer’s disease, type 2 diabetes and fatty liver disease). To this end, we integrate various omics data from epidemiological studies, apply advanced statistical methods, and conduct state-of-the-art molecular and cellular model studies. I am involved in several national and international genomics consortia and lead some multi-centre collaborative projects.
Field(s) of expertise
Molecular epidemiology, Population genomics, Non-coding RNAs, microRNAs, Metabolomics, Biomarker discovery, Age-related diseases
Education and career
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A. Positions and career:
November 2022 – present
Associate Professor and PI of Molecular and Systems Epidemiology, Department of Epidemiology, Erasmus MC, Rotterdam, the Netherlands
June 2019 – October 2022
Assistant Professor and PI of Molecular and Systems Epidemiology, Department of Epidemiology, Erasmus MC, Rotterdam, the Netherlands
July 2017- May 2019
Postdoctoral researcher, Department of Epidemiology, Erasmus MC University Medical Center, Rotterdam, the Netherlands
Dec 2012 - June 2017
PhD candidate, Department of Epidemiology, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, the Netherlands
Sep 2011 - Nov 2012
PhD candidate, Department of Hematology, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, the Netherlands
May 2008 - May 2010
CEO of “Shamim Salamat Parsian” company for Health and Medical Services, Mashhad, Iran
Nov 2007 - Aug 2010
General practitioner, Emergency ward of Qaem Hospital, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran
June 2005 - Aug 2011
Academic employee and manager, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran
B. Academic education and degrees:
July 2017
Doctorate degree (PhD), Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, the Netherlands
Aug 2015
Master of Science (MSc) in Health Sciences, Genetic Epidemiology, Netherlands Institute for Health Sciences (NIHES), Rotterdam, the Netherlands
Nov 2004
Medical degree (MD), Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran
Publications
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=mohsen+ghanbari
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=pwJpmOQAAAAJ&hl=nl
Teaching activities
In the last five years, I have been a lecturer and teaching assistant in several courses. I was a teaching assistant in the course “Principles of Epidemiology” in Erasmus Summer Program 2016. Between 2017 and 2019, I was teaching in the course “Cardiovascular Epidemiology” which is part of the Epidemiology Master program of NIHES. Moreover, I was a lecturer in the course “Genomics in Molecular Medicine” between 2017 and 2019, which extends to issue on omics data analysis in epidemiological studies. I was also a lecture in the “Molecular Epidemiology” course provided by Imperial College London in 2020 and 2021. Since 2021, I am coordinator and the main lecturer in the course “Principles of Genetic Epidemiology” in the Erasmus Summer Program. I am also co-coordinator and lecturer in two courses “Introduction to Epigenomics & Transcriptomics” and “Introduction to Proteomics & Metabolomics” provided by NIHES from 2022. In addition to teaching in these courses, I have supervised/still supervise research projects of dozens of MSc and PhD students through regular meetings, in which I have taught/teach them the concepts and common methods of molecular and genetic epidemiology.
Scholarships, grants, and awards
- MODEM grant, A national multi-centric grant for understanding Mechanisms Of Dementia, Co-investigator, 2022-2027
- Alzheimer Nederland grant, Role of non-coding RNAs in metabolic pathways underlying Alzheimer’s disease, Main investigator, 2022-2024.
- Erasmus MC Fellowship, Atlas of genetic architecture and disease association of microRNAs, Main Investigator, 2022-2026.
- SOPHIA grant, A multi-centric H2020 grant for Obesity, Co-investigator, 2020-2023
- An NIH grant for Gene-lifestyle interaction analysis, Co-investigator, 2021-2023
- Janssen Prevention Center in Leiden, the Netherlands, Prevention Biomarkers, Co-Investigator, 2017-2020.
- Alzheimer Nederland travel grant, Casual Inference and Alzheimer’s disease, 2018
- European Fellowship for study of the Diabetes, Visiting Imperial College London, 2018
- European Society of Human Genetics fellowship, Advanced courses in Human Genetics, 2016
- Iranian Ministry of Health and Medical Education Scholarship, 4-year fund for PhD research, 2011-2015
