Communicable and Non-Communicable Diseases

This course aims to provide students with an integrated understanding of both communicable and non-communicable diseases, highlighting their distinct biological mechanisms, epidemiological features, prevention strategies and health impacts.
The course is divided in two parts:
The "Non-Communicable Diseases" part offers an in-depth exploration of chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disorders, diabetes, cancers, lung diseases and neurodegenerative conditions, emphasizing on cellular and molecular mechanisms, public health strategies and biomedical approaches to prevention and treatment.
The "Communicable Diseases" part discusses human-microbe interactions, antimicrobial compounds, mechanisms of action and resistance, identifying novel conventional targets for antimicrobial discovery, and non-conventional targets for novel generation of antimicrobial compounds, challenges in novel antimicrobial compound discovery
The course fosters critical reasoning, interdisciplinary analysis and the ability to contextualize disease patterns, while preparing students to engage with emerging challenges in biomedical research and pharmaceutical innovation.

At the end of the course, the students are expected to possess a solid knowledge and understanding on the pathological bases for precision medicine interventions. The acquired skills and competencies will be the tools through which the students will improve their capacity to correlate the different concepts in different areas of precision medicine, applying their skills to the comprehension of complex problems in this field. Moreover, they will be enabled to implement better judgment, communication skills and learning abilities in this complex scientific area, especially in relationship with topics relevant to biotechnology.