Biography
Photo by: wikipedia, Creative Commons
Around the Great Nile junction, I was born on October 26th, 1975 and grew to enjoy a childhood full of wonderful memories, in the peaceful City of Khartoum, the lovely capital of the largest country in Africa and the home of the famous Sudanese liberator, Alemam Almahadi.
I am the youngest in a family of three sisters a brother and loving parents. My father was born in 1933 in “Dongla”, a small town located in Northern Sudan. He studied Arabic Linguistics and Islamic Shariea’a. He progressed up the civil service ladder, to become the Deputy Minister for The Ministry of Culture and Information. He retired in 1991 after serving his country for thirty years of his life. He was always loved and respected by the city community members. My mother was born in 1942 in the same town as my father, “Dongla”. She studied Family Sciences at a time where many girls did not have the privilege of university education. She progressed in her teaching career to become a senior education supervisor in Family Sciences for the Ministry of Education. Her colleagues knew her as a good-natured, contented woman with a lavish personality.
Out of all this, my mother is the one I miss most; she devoted her life to her family and in particular to me. Her family were her centre of attention, she filled our lives with her kindness, devotion and native intelligence. She lost her battle to breast cancer in August 1997 after four and half years of surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and worst of all, anticipation of the unwanted. After that it was for myself and my father to keep a sad family home occupied, especially when my elder brother and sisters have to live abroad for better opportunities in life. Nevertheless, they continued to provide their support, morally and financially for my father and myself.
Although our family is small, the Nasrs are well known in Khartoum. My eldest sister “Iman” is a Law graduate of Cairo University in Khartoum in 1983., she got married in 1985.and was working with Plan Sudan Organization in Khartoum. My second sister “Wisal” is a Computer Informatics graduate. She got married in 1995 and was working in The Institute of Academic Law Comparative Studies in Khartoum. My third sister “Abeer” is a medical doctor graduated from El-Azhar University-Cairo, Egypt in 1993. She got married in 1994 and is currently working in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. My elder brother “Ayman” is also a medical doctor graduated in 1994 from Faculty of Medicine, University of Khartoum. He is currently working as a Consultant Surgeon in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Having finished high school; I wanted to study science. It has always been a dream for me although it is not considered one of the attractive studies as medicine and engineering back home. When I was accepted in Al-Neelin University to study science, it was one of the most memorable days in my life. I felt very lucky that day as one of my dreams had finally come true. I put all my efforts and concentration in my chosen field to graduate in 1999 with “Honours”.
After graduating with a degree of Bachelor of Biological Sciences, I was appointed in the same faculty as a teaching assistant, to carry on research toward a Master degree and then a PhD degree. I was also working in the evenings as a clinical laboratory technologist in one of the medical clinics in Khartoum.
To facilitate my research experience, I joined The Institute of Endemic Diseases (I.E.D), University of Khartoum, as one of the well-recognised research institutes in Sudan working in the field of tropical diseases. I learnt different research methodology techniques to investigate tropical diseases. I improved my understanding of issues related to study designs, research ethics, sample collections, laboratory analysis and results interpretation. In the (I.E.D), I fulfilled the requirements for a Master in Science in about nine months. The tool was polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for studying the immune regulation on the gene level, and I was excited about developing an understanding of how and why studying molecules can change our live. This is an old subject, but to me it involved a new level of understanding that was quite modern in our department at the university. After that I was accepted to do the Master in Immune-Biology with Dr. Omran F. Osman and Dr. Gehad El-Ghazali at the Malaria Research Centre (MalRC), Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, University of Khartoum. I worked for three malaria transmission seasons at New Halfa region in Eastern Sudan. While still working on the natural acquired immunity of malaria patients, I needed to learn more techniques to improve my knowledge in order to develop the malaria control trials.
It has always been a family dream to see me achieve high degrees abroad and to return home with excellent knowledge to become a university lecturer who will be able to inspire new generations.
In 2005 Dr. El-Ghazali (a graduate of Stockholm) suggested that I should continue my study on the genes associated with susceptibility to severe malaria and to proceed to a pre-PhD (Accepted for PhD programme at University of Khartoum), especially that Klavs Berzins (Professor) and Marita Troye-Blomberg (Professor), are working on the same topic for a long time and they also have high experience on the research of malaria.
I spent some of my most memorable years in Stockholm where I learnt the robes of research. I worked effortlessly in the labs, collecting data and working through various publications. I was proud to get my PhD Degree in October 2008, in an unforgetful celebration where I was joined by my family, friends and wife to be.
I am currently working as an Assistant Professor at Department of Basic Medical Sciences, College of Medicine, King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences (www.ksau-hs.edu.sa), King Abdulaziz Medical City, National Guard Health Affairs, KSA.