Sajid Umar, DVM, MPhil, PhD
Sajid Umar is an infectious disease epidemiologist at Duke Kunshan University China. Dr. Umar is a deputy director of Emerging Infectious Diseases & One Health Research program. His research experience and expertise include epidemiology of emerging infectious diseases, particularly zoonotic diseases that occur at the human and animal interface. Over the years, he has gained considerable laboratory experience at BSL-1 to BSL-3 environments using serological and molecular diagnostic techniques and has worked extensively in multiple countries on epidemiological studies. His primary research interests are in identifying occupational diseases associated with respiratory viruses among persons with occupational contact with livestock, companion animals and poultry by using innovative sampling techniques. Furthermore, he works on the epidemiology and molecular detection of infectious viruses of human and animal origin (influenza viruses, parainfluenza, RSV, coronaviruses, enteroviruses, and adenoviruses etc.), antimicrobial resistance, monitoring zoonosis and reverse zoonosis events at interface of animals and vulnerable human populations who have intense contact with animal reservoirs. In addition to epidemiological research, he has a strong passion for global health and scientific research capacity building. This includes student trainings, the development of new collaborative international research networks and laboratory infrastructure to advance diagnostic approaches for the surveillance of viral respiratory pathogens in healthcare settings, livestock farms, schools, airports, and subways.
Dr. Umar is based at Duke Kunshan University, an innovative liberal arts university located close to Shanghai. Duke Kunshan University is a Sino-American partnership of Duke University, Wuhan University and Kunshan city in Jiangsu province to create a world-class university offering a range of academic programs for students from China and throughout the world. A nonprofit, joint-venture institution, Duke Kunshan University was granted the accreditation approval by China’s Ministry of Education in September 2013. At Duke Kunshan University, he teaches courses on Emerging infectious disease, evolution of infectious disease, evolution of health and disease, and microbial ecology. He has also taught an interdisciplinary miniterm course on “Global Health Laboratory Techniques”.
Dr. Umar earned a Ph.D. in the discipline of pathology and virology (2017) from the National Veterinary School of Toulouse, France and worked with renowned French pathologist Maxence Delverdier and virologist Mariette Ducatez. He earned Master of Philosophy (MPhil) in Veterinary Pathology (2011) and a graduation in Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) (2008) from the University of Veterinary & Animal Sciences (UVAS), Lahore. Before academia, he worked as Postdoctoral Research Fellow (2018-2019) at Istanbul University, Turkey and Duke Kunshan University, China (2020-2021) and worked with Gregory Charles Gray and Benjamin Anderson.
Students
Muhammad Shaban
Rija Naeem
Maciej Matuszczak
Chen Zhang
Palpasha Karki
