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JuLy 2011 volume 15, Number 4
R&D News ......................... 1 Appointments .................... 6 Pharma Notes.................... 7 New Products .................. 14 Calendar .......................... 17 Career Spotlight............... 18
Dr. Gordon Keller
SteM CeLL City OPeNS
UHN’s McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine announced the creation of Stem Cell City, a virtual community designed to inform the public about stem cell research and allow them to articulate their support of using regenerative medicine to fight disease.
According to Dr. Gordon Keller, director of the McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine, Stem Cell City is an online web portal designed to teach the public about the body’s tiny, tissue-generating powerhouses and to inform them of the latest research aimed at defeating the most devastating diseases afflicting humans — from heart and lung disease to Alzheimer’s and diabetes. The site includes virtual tours of the centre’s labs, allows visitors to key into research areas of personal interest as well as provides options to donate to research.
Other notable features of the site include: • Join the community. Explore the world of regenerative medicine,
find out more about the promise of stem cell research, and add your support to the call for an accelerated approach to eradicating the major disease of our time. • Follow the discoveries. Receive updates on the work being done in the areas of heart, blood, diabetes, neurology and lung and the progress being made toward cures. • Direct the research. Channel your support directly to the areas of research that matter the most to your personally. Representatives of the McEwen research community were joined for the Stem
Cell City announcement by representatives of the Ontario Government, the University Health
Network (UHN), the international stem cell community, and patient advocates to help launch this online initiative.
The “city” was opened June 15, 2011 by the Centre’s co-cofounders Rob and Cheryl McEwen. They were joined by Dr. Keller, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, Minister of Citizenship and Education Dr. Eric Hoskins, UHN CEO and president Dr. Robert Bell, California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) chairman Robert Klein and patient advocate Lisa Ray.
For more information or to join Stem Cell City go to www. joinstemcellcity.com.
NewS
Team from NrC reCogNized for developiNg NeurosurgiCal simulaTor
The National Research Council of Canada (NRC) is recognizing 52 employees for exceptional success during its Outstanding Achievement Awards.
The NeuroTouch team leads were awarded the “NRC Breakthrough of the Year Award” for their creation of a neurosurgical simulator called NeuroTouch. This state-of-the-art technology allows neurosurgeons to rehearse complex surgeries on simulated brain tumours that are specifically tailored to their patients, reducing the risk of complications and speeding up recovery. Their work is part of the Genomics and Health Initiative, a cross-country multidisciplinary collaboration.
As a result of this initiative, seven virtual reality training centres will be established across the country, four of which already exist in Halifax, Montréal, Ottawa and Toronto.
The NeuroTouch team leads have helped Canada remain a world leader in next-generation virtual medical simulation. The NeuroTouch technology is laying the groundwork for sharing know-how and advanced made-in-Canada solutions with the world.
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NewS
SCieNtiStS MAP PAth tO geNerAte reNewABLe ANtiBOdieS
In the first study of its kind to date, an international group of scientists including Drs. Tony Pawson and Karen Colwill at Mount Sinai Hospital and Drs. Dev Sidhu and Aled Edwards at the University of Toronto have highlighted the power of renewable antibody technologies to create precise reagents for use in biomedical research.
This methodology will help accelerate scientists’ understanding of all the proteins coded in the human genome. The study was published online in the biomedical journal Nature Methods.
Antibodies are essential tools in biomedicine, used both for discovery and therapy. However, many commercially available antibodies for research are of inadequate quality and supply, which hinders scientists from identifying new causes of and potential therapies for diseases including cancer. The problem is compounded because the genomic revolution has dramatically increased the demand for renewable, highquality affinity reagents to the many newly discovered and uncharacterized proteins.
“The use of renewable antibodies hasn’t been fully exploited,” said Dr Tony Pawson, distinguished investigator at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute of Mount Sinai Hospital and study coauthor. “Our study shows we can rapidly make reagents that are highly specific to a large number of proteins, which will facilitate a more precise examination of the proteins and pathways involved in various complex illnesses.”
“The potential of the human Medical diagnostic company Miraculins Inc. will receive $100,000 in grant funding from the Manitoba Technology Commercialization Program to support the commercialization of its PreVu non-invasive cholesterol test.
PreVu evaluates the additional risk a person may have for coronary artery disease (CAD) by simply and painlessly testing their skin cholesterol level. High levels of skin cholesterol have been shown to be correlated to CAD as measured by stress test, angiography, coronary calcium, carotid intima media thickness, inflammatory markers of vascular disease, previous heart attack incidents and Framingham risk score.
The Technology Commercialization Program is a Province of Manitoba initiative which assists Manitoba-based companies in the commercialization of technologies. The financial assistance program provides funding to cover up to 50 per cent of eligible costs including legal fees, patenting, marketing studies, literature development, product certification, prototyping, process validation and technical consulting costs. The maximum cost-sharing available under the program is $100,000.
genome project has not yet been fully realized because we haven’t had the full set of necessary tools,” echoed Dr Sidhu, principal investigator at the University of Toronto’s Donnelly Centre for Cellular & Biomolecular Research, and director of the Toronto Recombinant Antibody Centre (TRAC). “The team has now generated a roadmap to dramatically increase the number and quality of these tools, and this is an important advance.”
Participating institutions include the University of Toronto, University of Chicago (USA), University of Cambridge (Britain), Karolinska Institutet (Sweden), Technische Universität Braunschweig (Germany), Monash University (Australia) and the Royal Institute of Technology (Sweden). The study received support from the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, Canada Foundation for Innovation, Genome Canada through the Ontario Genomics Institute, GlaxoSmithKline, the Karolinska Institutet, the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation, the Ontario Innovation Trust, the Ontario Ministry for Research and Innovation, Merck & Co, the Novartis Research Foundation, the Swedish Agency for Innovation Systems, the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research and the Wellcome Trust.
miraCuliNs reCeives $100,000 graNT Through TeChNology CommerCializaTioN program
CALL fOr PAPerS fOr PittCON 2012
OCCC
The program committee for Pittcon 2012 is inviting the scientific community to submit abstracts for contributed oral or poster presentations.
Joseph J Grabowski, PhD, program committee chairman, says his committee is seeking a diverse, yet comprehensive technical program covering all areas of analytical science and applied spectroscopy. A partial list of symposium topics will include: Instrumental analysis; chromatography, molecular and atomic spectroscopy, portable/hand-held instruments, electrochemistry, mass spectrometry, and lab-on-chip technology, and novel application of measurement science; nanotechnology, biomedicine, neurochemistry, genomics, proteomics, metabolomics, metabonomics, forensics, informatics, pharmaceutical, environmental, polymer, and food science.
The deadline for submissions is August 12, 2011. Authors will be notified in October 2011, by email only, as to the status of their abstracts.
Pittcon 2012 takes place on March 11-15 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, FL.
NewS therALASe ANd geOrge BrOwN COLLege JOiN iN gOverNMeNtfuNded reSeArCh tO COMBAt fOOd CONtAMiNAtiON
Theralase Technologies Inc. is partnering with George Brown College’s Centre for Hospitality and Culinary Arts to conduct applied research in the use of patented photodynamic compounds (PDCs) activated by its proprietary laser technology to destroy microbial pathogens associated with food contamination.
This food safety approach, believed to be the first of its kind, is supported by the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). PDCs are light sensitive molecules that have the ability to attach themselves to specific cell types, in this case food pathogens such as bacteria, and are able to destroy these cells upon light activation.
Theralase Technologies Inc, founded in Toronto in 1995, designs, develops and manufactures patented, superpulsed laser technology utilized in biostimulation and biodestruction applications.
“In the wake of many outbreaks of consumer food contaminations associated with microbial pathogens such as Listeria monocytogenes (Listeria) and Escherichia coli (E. coli) and their various strains, Theralase initiated the study to determine the feasibility of using our patented PDCs for sanitation in the food service, food manufacturing and medical industries,” said Roger Dumoulin - White, president & CEO of Theralase Inc. “Given their history and pedigree in culinary arts and additional focus on food applied research, the George Brown College Centre for Hospitality and Culinary Arts is a perfect partner for applied research in new and innovative sanitation protocols and techniques using the company’s patented lasers and photodynamic compounds.”
The 14-week food safety feasibility study will determine the specific areas in food processing facilities where pathogen contamination is not being adequately addressed by current processes and procedures. The results of the study are expected in September 2011 and will be followed by further lab testing and a pilot project at a commercial food processing facility.
Dr. Frédéric Charron, and Luisa Izzi.. Photos: IRCM
BreakThrough aT The irCm Could help uNdersTaNd CerTaiN CaNCers
A scientific breakthrough by researchers at the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal (IRCM) will be published in Developmental Cell, a scientific journal of the Cell Press group. Led by Dr. Frédéric Charron, the team of scientists discovered a new requirement for the proper functioning of the Sonic Hedgehog protein.
Sonic Hedgehog belongs to a family of proteins that gives cells the information needed for the embryo to develop properly. It plays a critical role in the development of many of the body’s organs, such as the central nervous system. Malfunctions of these proteins are associated with many diseases including cancer, which is the leading cause of death in Canada.
“On one hand, certain molecules travel through our organs (in this case, Sonic Hedgehog) and transmit signals to cells with information on how they should function,” explains Luisa Izzi, postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Charron’s laboratory and co-first author of the article. “On the other hand, our cells have receptors to receive these signals. The receptors then instruct the cell’s DNA as to which genes to turn on or off in order to perform its function.”
The team studied the interactions between the Sonic Hedgehog molecule and the recently-identified receptors Boc, Cdon and Gas1, all found on the surface of cells. “Our research showed, unexpectedly, that these receptors are essential for the transmission of the hedgehog molecule’s signal,” adds Martin Lévesque, an alumnus from Dr. Charron’s research unit and co-first author of the article.
“Disrupting the transmission of the Sonic Hedgehog signal can lead to diseases,” says Dr. Charron, director of the IRCM’s Molecular Biology of Neural Development research unit. “A better knowledge of the receptors Boc, Cdon and Gas1 might in turn help our understanding of pathologies associated with defective Sonic Hedgehog signalling. Our results could also lead to new avenues for the treatment of certain diseases such as cancer.”
Research carried out in Dr. Charron’s laboratory was funded by the Canadian Cancer Society, the Fonds de recherche en santé du Québec (FRSQ), and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR).
u Of S PArtNerS with federAL AgeNCieS ON uNique Study Of vitAMiN d iNSuffiCieNCy
One in four Canadians aged six to 79 has vitamin D blood levels below internationally recommended levels, a first-in-Canada study led by the University of Saskatchewan, in partnership with Statistics Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada, has found.
When individuals taking vitamin D supplements were excluded from the data, evidence of low vitamin D blood levels was even greater. In fact, during the winter months, more than one-third of Canadians not using supplements did not meet the level associated with the recommended daily allowance, the study found.
“We have shown the advantage that supplement use and sun exposure can have to help Canadians maintain their vitamin D status,” said U of S nutrition professor Susan Whiting.
Low vitamin D can increase the risk of bone-related problems such as rickets, osteomalacia (softening of the bones), and osteoporosis. Low vitamin D may also compromise the immune and inflammatory systems.
The new study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, suggests that current food choices alone are insufficient to maintain recommended vitamin D levels for many Canadians, especially in winter. The study is the first in Canada to examine vitamin D intake in comparison to levels outlined in the U.S. Institute of Medicine’s 2011 Dietary Reference Intake (DRI) report which sets out the estimated average daily vitamin D requirements for individuals. The Canadian government has accepted that report as the basis for new recommended values for vitamin D and calcium levels considered adequate for specific age groups, as well as safe upper levels.
The research was conducted by Whiting and Hassan Vatanparast of the U of S College of Pharmacy and Nutrition in collaboration with Linda Greene-Finestone of Public Health Agency of Canada and Kellie Langlois of Statistics Canada.
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