Professor and Chair
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Dr. Raz Shaikh has expertise in the fields of nutrition/obesity, immunology, lipid biochemistry, and membrane biophysics using mouse models, human samples, and clinical trials. His research program fuses several broad approaches to address questions related to the prevention and treatment of complications associated with diet-induced obesity, with a notable focus on chronic inflammation and susceptibility to influenza infection. His laboratory has specifically led efforts to show that obesity impairs inflammation resolution by decreasing the levels of key n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA)-derived metabolites in mice and humans, which promotes chronic inflammation and poor responses to infections. Dr. Shaikh is a former board member of the ASN and is currently a board member of the International Society for the Study of Fatty Acids and Lipids (ISSFAL). He has received several awards from the ASN and ISSFAL for his research.