Neuro-immune and circadian control of somatosensation and pain

Nader Ghasemlou, PhD, McGill University

Nader Ghasemlou completed his PhD at McGill University under the supervision of Dr. Samuel David studying the neuroinflammatory basis of spinal cord injury. He completed his postdoctoral work, funded by the FRSQ and a CIHR Banting Fellowship, at Harvard Medical School in the laboratory of Dr. Clifford Woolf. His postdoctoral research on pain physiology provided new insight into the interactions between the nervous and immune systems in the pathogenesis of acute and chronic inflammatory pain. Since 2015, Dr. Ghasemlou has led the Pain Chronobiology & Neuroimmunology Lab at Queen’s University. His group is studying the role of neuroinflammation in the context of postoperative pain, as well as how circadian rhythms modulate pain outcomes. Collaborations with clinician-scientists provides Dr. Ghasemlou’s team the opportunity to translate their findings from bedside-to-bench, an approach that may more quickly reach those suffering from pain.