David Vasir, PhD

David Vasir, PhD, a Senior Research Analyst at PHEN, earned his Bachelor of Science degree from the University of St. Andrews in Fife, Scotland, U.K., in 1981 and his Master of Science degree from the University of Wales College of Medicine in Wales, U.K., in 1985. He then went on to earn his Doctor of Philosophy at Jesus College and Oxford University Medical School in 1991. 

Dr. Vasir has been an investigator on several cancer vaccine programs where he designed and implemented a number of immunological based assays to monitor the pre-vaccination and post-vaccination immunological status of patients with breast, renal ovarian carcinomas, and patients with multiple myeloma in cancer vaccine clinical trials. The majority of these analyses pertained to a detailed pre-vaccination and post-vaccination analysis of the immune system as determined by Th1 and Th2 immune responses, levels, and functions of regulatory T cells as determined by surface markers, FOXP3 expression, and specific and non-specific immunological analysis.  

In addition, Dr. Vasir has extensively studied ex-vivo the immunobiology of antigen induced regulatory T cells from their phenotypic characteristics using six color flow cytometry analysis, their in vitro functional properties, their interaction with antigen presenting cells, detailed Th1 and Th2 cytokine profiles of segregated populations of regulatory T cells using multiplex arrays, and use of various strategies to reverse the suppressive properties of these cells. 

 Dr. Vasir also investigated the identification of specific microRNAs and kinases in six color sorted regulatory T cells isolated from the ascites of patients with advanced ovarian cancer, identifying and targeting cancer stem cells using small molecules, isolation, and characterization of stem cells for regenerative medicine.