Notes from the Director’s Chair

Notes from the Director’s Chair
March was a busy month. Winter never left, grant writing was constant and spring is now
here? May the luck of the Irish be with us as we look for true spring weather in the month
of April. April snow brings May showers and June flowers. It was not all bad news as
described below.
Alex Kuzyk and Brent Guppy won Emerging Leader’s awards from the U of M. The
award recognizes students who are committed to furthering the university’s educational
mission by contributing to the social, cultural or economic well-being of communities on
and off campus, while encouraging cross-cultural understanding and demonstrating
sustained leadership and initiative.
Please remember as representatives of MICB and CCMB that if you are contacted by the
media or a granting agency for interviews, photos or a discussion about your work, to let
Dr. Gibson, Eilean McKenzie-Matwiy or David Hultin in CancerCare Manitoba’s
Communication’s department know ahead of time. CCMB requires all media to be
escorted throughout the building. In addition, we want the Institute recognized for the
great place it is and the work we do. Thank you for your cooperation!
Jim Davie will be part of a panel discussion on Cancer Epigenetics at the 2nd annual
Epigenetics, Eh! Conference in London, Ontario from June 24-27, 2014. He is also
continuing his efforts to establish an epigenetics network in Manitoba.
At the same time, Geoff Hicks and Abraham Fainsod will be chairing a session on animal
models of FASD at the Research Society on Alcoholism Conference in Bellevue,
Washington. Dr. Hicks also received new funding from the Manitoba Liquor Board for
his ongoing research on FASD.
We welcomed representatives from the Canadian Breast Cancer
Foundation – Prairies/NWT and Federated Co-op Ltd for a cheque
presentation on March 13th. Federated Co-op donated $1.5m to
CBCF-Prairies/NWT to support breast cancer research. The money
raised was from their Drink Pink coffee campaign from Co-op gas
stations and grocery stores. CBCF is the third largest source of
grant revenue and currently supports 7 different research projects at
MICB donating nearly $4m over the last 7 years.
March 2014
Congratulations to Versha Banerji on being awarded a research grant from the Shastri
Indo-Canada Institute worth 6000000 rupees. The grant is with Dr. Renu Saxena of the
All India Institute of Medical Sciences to support research on CLL between Canada and
India. Now if only that was in Canadian dollars!
On April 2, 2014, Sara Beiggi passed her oral defense for her
Ph.D. degree at the University of Manitoba. It was a long
journey with many different turns along the way but in the
end she finished her degree and will be pursuing a PostDoctoral Fellowship at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester,
Minnesota. Congratulations and good luck with your
continuing research.
We bid farewell to Sadi Al-Muktafi from the Tumour Bank
and wish him all the best in his future endeavors.
CCMB Research Day will be held on May 8th. Abstracts are
due on April 24th, 2014. All trainees are encouraged to apply for either an oral or poster
presentation. The guest speaker will be Dr. Lillian Siu from the Drug Development
Program at Princess Margaret Hospital, Ontario Cancer Institute.
The CancerCare Manitoba Foundation will be installing TV sets throughout patient areas
to highlight some of the accomplishments and discoveries made here. We are looking for
students and fellows to submit a brief summary to Eilean McKenzie-Matwiy about their
research to be viewed on the TV set. On a similar note, the Foundation has launched its
Kick Cancer campaign to raise awareness in preventing cancers and raise funds. You
will see this symbol in all Safeway stores for next several months.
Our yeast samples were unceremoniously packed
underneath an astronaut’s seat in the Soyuz capsule
for the return flight to Earth. The samples landed in
Khazakstan and were couriered to Winnipeg on
March 17th. Surprisingly, the green tea samples are
now purple. The control samples from space appear
turbid but viable for plating. Unfortunately, the
control samples that remained on Earth were
contaminated with fungi and need to be remade
before plating. We hope to have preliminary results
by mid-April.
March 2014
On March 20th we welcomed a tour of grade 9 students from Shaftsbury Park’s Youth in
Philanthropy to see the impact of CCMF funding on cancer research
and tumour banking.
The 6th annual Challenge for Life 20K walk will happen on June 7th
at Assiniboine Park. I was volunteered to walk on the treadmill to
support the cause. To create your own team or support a walker,
click here:
http://www.cancercarefdn.mb.ca/netcommunity/challenge-forlife/2014/
Publications:
Minuk GY, Lerner B, Gibson SB, Johnston JB, Uhanova J, Andonov A, Wu J .Hepatitis
B and hepatitis C viral infections in patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Can J
Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2014 Mar;28(3):131-4
Stammers DM, Israels SJ, Lambert PJ, Cuvelier GD.Cancer incidence, morbidity, and
survival in Canadian first nation children: A Manitoba population-based study from the
cancer in young people in Canada (CYP-C) registry. Pediatr Blood Cancer. 2014 Feb 26.
doi: 10.1002/pbc.25005. [Epub ahead of print]
Bush JW, Hancock BJ, Israels SJ, Ellison DW, Stefanovici C, Krawitz S. Intracranial
atypical teratoid/rhabdoid tumour presenting as an axillary mass: A case report and
review of literature. Pediatr Dev Pathol. 2014 Feb 20. [Epub ahead of print]
Righolt CH, Guffei A, Knecht H, Young IT, Stallinga S, van Vliet LJ, Mai S.
Differences in Nuclear DNA Organization Between Lymphocytes, Hodgkin, and ReedSternberg Cells Revealed by Structured Illumination Microscopy. J Cell Biochem. 2014
Mar 4. doi: 10.1002/jcb.24800. [Epub ahead of print]
Chighvinadze T, Pistorius S. The effect of detector size and energy resolution on image
quality in multi-projection Compton scatter tomography. J Xray Sci Technol.
2014;22(1):113-28. doi: 10.3233/XST-130413.
Grants:
April 4 - St Baldrick’s Scholar award
March 2014
April 9 – FAAF Heart & Stroke Foundation of Manitoba Primary Prevention Challenge
April 14
- Bladder cancer travel fellowship
- CIHR Research catalyst network Rare Diseases
April 15
- Paul Thorlakson Foundation
- CIHR-CCSRI Prevention research grant
- UofM Faculty of Graduate Studies Women’s Health Research Foundation of Canada
Scholarship
- LOI March of Dimes Prematurity Research
April 16 - FAAF Brain tumour foundation of Canada operating grants
April 22 – Multiple Myeloma Research fellowship
April 23 – Heart & Stroke Foundation of Manitoba Primary Prevention challenge
April 30
- FAAF W. Garfield Weston Foundation Biomarkers across neurodegenerative
diseases
- LOI March of Dimes General Research program
- Brain tumour foundation of Canada operating grant
- Cancer Research society fellowship
May 1
- Canadian Foundation for Fetal Alcohol Research
- C17 Children’s cancer and blood disorders grant (LOI due Nov/13)
- MICH Travel grants
- CIHR Chair applied public health
- LOI NSERC CREATE program (FAAF March 31)
May 2 – ASH Visitor Training Program
March 2014
Since you’re still reading…..
March 2014