Rus Dashtaki

Biography

Rus is a native of North Carolina and grew up in Greensboro raised by parents who were Persian Zoroastrian. He graduated from Eastern Guilford High School as Valedictorian of his class in 1992 and also was a Pepsi Cola Scholar Athlete in Track, Cross Country, and Varsity Basketball. From there he was accepted to Duke University on a merit scholarship and graduated in 1996 on the Dean's List with a BSE in Biomedical Engineering. During his time there he worked with Dr. Harold Strauss as a Cardiac Research Fellow with the American Heart Association and studied the effects of various drugs on cardiac action potentials. He also collaborated with UNC Chapel Hill and Boston University School of Medicine to design the first ever mobile Biotechnology bus for the state of North Carolina. The UNC Destiny mobile bus was designed to bring state of the art Biotechnology laboratory modules into the classrooms of minority high schools and colleges in North Carolina to encourage students to learn about science and consider careers in Biotechnology. After attending Duke he worked with Dr. Richard Whorton and Dr. Thomas Kennedy studying the effects of various drugs to treat asthma in rat tracheal smooth muscle cells. He published a research paper in the Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics in May of 1998. After his year of research he attended Wake Forest University School of Medicine and worked with Dr. Earl Watts to help minorities in the community find affordable health care and volunteered his time treating patients at the local Community Care Clinic near downtown Winston-Salem. From there he has been teaching Biology, Anatomy, and Physiology courses for over 20 years and is very passionate about education and helping others succeed.