Dr. D. Craig Ayre is an associate professor of molecular sciences, with over 15 years of experience in higher education, and biological research. He received his Doctorate of Philosophy in Biochemistry (specialized in immunology), and his Bachelor of Adult and Post-Secondary Education from Memorial University of Newfoundland, in St. John’s, Canada.Dr. Ayre has a wide-range of experience in the classroom, and in the laboratory. In addition to his three years of teaching basic medical sciences for a USMLE-driven curriculum, he has an additional 5 years of expertise in higher education within biology, chemistry and molecular science. His teaching experience includes 4 years as a Laboratory instructor for the College of the North Atlantic-Qatar (Now Doha University of Science and Technology) in Doha, Qatar, 1 year (part-time) a Professor with Algonquin College in the Applied Science and Biotechnology program in Ottawa, Canada, and nearly 3 years teaching for the University of Medicine and Health Sciences in St. Kitts.

As a researcher, Dr. Ayre has contributed to more than 10 primary-research publications in immunology, personalized medicine and liquid biopsy. He has exceptional experience at multi-omics analysis (DNA, RNA and Protein) of biological samples. His specialization is in the function and composition of extracellular vesicles – small cellular organelles with important communications functions that are an active research area for their utility in health monitoring or disease diagnosis. He is a specialist in flow cytometry, and its application in vesical monitoring, or multi-spectral immune phenotyping. In addition to this work, Dr. Ayre was a clinical trial principal scientist, specialized in immunological monitoring. During his career, he was responsible for managing over 40 clinical programs in this area.

Within UMHS, Dr. Ayre is an active lecturer in the molecular sciences department, contributing to many of its courses. Outside the classroom he is an active member of various faculty committees including student admissions, curriculum management and most recently as chair of the university research committee.