November is the beginning of winter and with colder weather... us that Christmas is around the corner. This also reminds... Notes from the Director’s Chair:

November is the beginning of winter and with colder weather... us that Christmas is around the corner. This also reminds... Notes from the Director’s Chair:

Notes from the Director’s Chair:
November is the beginning of winter and with colder weather and snow on the ground it reminds
us that Christmas is around the corner. This also reminds me that the MICB/BMG Christmas
party will be held on Dec. 14th between 2:30-4:00pm at Pedway Café. There will be good food
for everyone. Be sure to sign up in the MICB office by November 30th. I hope that everyone will
make it.
Every year, MICB and CancerCare Manitoba put on a
special day of Trick or Treating for the kids undergoing
chemotherapy in Pediatric Oncology. We celebrate by
decorating the labs and handing out goody bags of
toys, candy, posters, and stickers to all the kids. This
year, MICB went above and beyond with the costumes.
Please click here to watch a slide show of our creative
and dedicated crew of Halloween goblins. Special
thanks to Eileen McMillan-Ward for organizing this
activity each year and donations from McDonald's, Old
Dutch, and The Winnipeg Blue Bombers. Alexandra
Kuzyk (in the KFC outfit) and Eileen McMillan-Ward (a platelet) won 1st and 2nd prize
respectively for their costumes in the CancerCare Manitoba Costume Competition.
The MICB and the Department of Biochemistry &
Medical Genetics hosted an afternoon of glow bowling
at Academy Lanes. This was an opportunity for
researchers to relax and socialize in a fun activity. Most
including myself were lousy bowlers but it was fun and
relaxing.
There was an emergency at MICB several weeks ago
when the Institute lost CO2 to its incubators. Through
the efforts of senior staff at MICB, a disaster was
avoided. I would like to especially thank Molly Pind and
Angela Kemp who spent Friday night until Saturday
morning keeping the CO2 levels at 5% in our incubators. I would also like to thank Sajesh,
Tarek, Liz, Armando and Yueqin for their help. In addition, Nicola Wigle brought over two tanks
from MICH so that we could have two on line and one backup. Together, they saved our tissue
culture and experiments and we are all grateful for their efforts. We discovered the leak was in
one of the lines for an incubator on the 5th floor. This line was replaced and in the future, we will
be replacing lines and fasteners for all incubators at the Institute to ensure this does not happen
again. In addition, we are reviewing emergency procedures so that we will be even better
prepared.
MICB is supported by
On November 9th, MICB was part of MHRC’s “Manitoba
– Where Health Research Comes to Life” event at the
Forks. This was an opportunity for MHRC funded
research groups to engage with the public and explain
our research. An interesting art exhibit that generated lot
of discussion were images of cells from Golam Sabbir
and Shihua He in the Davie lab. Special thanks to Eilean
McKenzie-Matwiy, Yueqin Zhou, Protiti Khan, Shannon
Healy, Alexandra Kuzyk, Sajesh Babu, and Brent Guppy
for volunteering at the MICB booth.
The Genomic Centre conducted another
workshop on Basic Imaging this month. There
were five participants and they learned Basic
Microscopy, Live Cell Imaging, Digital Imaging
and Documentation, Automated Sample
Analysis Fluorescent Dyes, Probes,
Instruments, Platforms and Application
Fluorescent in situ Hybridization, Different
Types and Applications, Introduction to Human
Cytogenetics, and FISH experiments, Imaging
of Samples, Data Analysis.
We are trying to stream line data requests coming through the Tumour Bank. We would like all
requests to come through our central triage team (AlMuktafi Sadi, Donna Hewitt and Courtney
Edworthy). The data requests will then be discussed prioritized and assigned by the triage team.
All data requests should be e-mailed to [email protected]. This e-mail will
distribute them to all members of the triage team. People requesting data must be prepared to
wait for a reasonable time frame in which data requests will be completed. This will depend on
the work load and staffing at the time of the data request. Currently this time frame is
approximately 2-3 weeks. When you request data please ensure that MB#'s are recorded
accurately including date suffix, and a list of data elements that you require. The addition of new
data elements requested after the initial submission will be treated as a new data request. We
are implementing this new model of data request processing immediately. If you have any
question or concerns please contact the triage team, or myself.
Dr. Nada Jabado, Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at McGill University will
be presenting "Epigenome Rewiring in Pediatric Glioblastoma" on November 29th at 11:00 12:00 in the CancerCare Manitoba Lecture Theatre. Her research was featured in Nature and I
invite everyone to attend this important talk.
The Western Canada Children's Cancer Research Network (WC3RN) was formed 3 years ago
as a means of gathering Western Canadian childhood cancer researchers together for closer
collaboration. At their last meeting, discussions around whether they should try to initiate a
MICB is supported by
Western Canadian biobank of pediatric tissues was raised, with the plan of having a small, part
formal - part informal meeting in Winnipeg in November. Thus, the WC3RN biobanking meeting
will be held in Winnipeg Nov 29/30th, 2012. On the evening of Thursday November 29th at the
Hotel Fort Garry, Dr. Nada Jabado will be the keynote speaker and on Friday November 30th the
meeting will be held at CCMB Arnold Greenberg Theatre to discuss creating a prairie biobank
for pediatric cancers. If you plan on attending please contact Cecile Verrier at
[email protected].
Dr. Hari Shroff, Chief and Investigator in the Section of High Resolution Optical Imaging at the
National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (Bethesda, MD) will be presenting
"Faster and Sharper: New 3D Imaging Technologies for Cells and Embryos". The seminar will
be held on November 26th at 12:00 - 1:00pm in BMSB Theatre B.
Dr. Sabine Mai was awarded a one year grant from the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of
Canada to study Hodgkins lymphoma. Congratulations!
In my continuing feature on research activities
for 2011/2012, I will discuss our disease
specific activity at CCMB. This graph
represents the amount of grant support
dedicated to a specific form of cancer. What
this graph tells us is most research is not
directed at a specific cancer nor is it
designated generally to cancer. When you look
at specific cancers, breast, leukemia and brain:
they have the most grant support. However this
is only a minority of the research being
conducted. Most disease specific grants are
generally characterized as cancer. This
illustrates that MICB researchers are
conducting basic science research that could
be applicable to cancer but not directed specifically at a type of cancer.
We bid a fond farewell to Dr. Wanpeng Sun whose final day in Dr. Mowat’s lab is November
30th. Wan is leaving us for a job in the pharmaceutical industry in Toronto.
A new feature of the Notes is profiling members of MICB. This month will
feature Dr. Iris Gehrke who is a post-doctoral fellow in Dr. Versha Banerji’s
laboratory. She studied Biology at the University at Cologne, Germany and
obtained a Diploma of Biology (MSc) with a major in biochemistry and minors
in pharmacology and physiology. She carried out her master thesis at the
MICB in 2005 under the supervision of Dr. Sabine Mai and went on to do her
PhD at the University at Cologne, Germany. Her research focuses on the
pathophysiology of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). CLL patients suffer
MICB is supported by
from a severely increased number of B-cells. This B-cell accumulation is the result of a defect in
the cell's ability to die. The leukemic B-cells require the interaction with non-leukemic cells within
the blood, lymph nodes and bone marrow of the CLL-patient to resist cell death. She studied
these death-preventing interactions between leukemic B-cells and their non-leukemic
microenvironment. The aim is to identify mechanisms which can be targeted by drugs to
eventually kill the leukemic B-cells. The highlight of her training so far was to receive a Young
Investigator Award from the International Society of Hematology (ISH) in 2010, which included a
trip to the ISH World Congress in Jerusalem, Israel, where she presented her work in an oral
presentation. She came to MICB because the research focus is a perfect fit into what she
wanted to work on during her time as a post doc. Further, the institute offers not only a large
spectrum of methods utilized in cancer research, but also the opportunity to translate your
research finding into clinical applications by close interaction with clinician scientists.
Publications:
Delcuve GP, Khan DH, Davie JR. Targeting class I histone deacetylases in cancer therapy.
Expert Opin Ther Targets. 2012 Oct 15. [Epub ahead of print].
Shashi Gujar, Rebecca Dielschneider, Derek Clements, Erin Helson, Maya Shmulevitz, Paola
Marcato, Da Pan, Lu-zhe Pan, Dae-Gyun Ahn, Abdulaziz Alawadhi and Patrick WK Lee
Multifaceted Therapeutic Targeting of Ovarian Peritoneal Carcinomatosis Through Virusinduced Immunomodulation. Mol Ther advance online publication, November 13, 2012;
doi:10.1038/mt.2012.228
• Rebecca is a graduate student in Dr. Gibson’s laboratory.
Israels SJ, Rand ML. What we have learned from inherited platelet disorders. Pediatr Blood
Cancer. 2012 Oct 25. doi: 10.1002/pbc.24345. [Epub ahead of print]
Julius Adebayo Awe, Mark Chu Xu, Janine Wechsler, Naoual Benali-Furet, Yvon E Cayre, Jeff
Saranchuk, Darrel Drachenberg, Sabine Mai. 3D telomeric analysis of isolated circulating tumor
cells (CTCs) defines CTC subpopulations. Translational Oncology. In press.
Grant deadlines:
An online calendar has been set up with grant deadlines. Please follow the link at
https://www.google.com/calendar/embed?src=manitobainstituteofcellbiology%40gmail.com&ctz
=America/Winnipeg or the new “Forms and Funding” button on www.micb.ca .
November 23 - CancerCare Manitoba Foundation Letter of Intent deadline for infrastructure and
equipment grants.
November 30 – Earlier.org Breast Cancer research program
MICB is supported by
-
Canadian Cancer Society Awards for Excellence in Cancer Research
-
Bayer Hemophilia Awards
December 1 – Friends for an Earlier Breast Cancer Test
-
Manning Innovation Award
December 3 – Canadian Diabetes Association Registration
-
CIHR Team grant in Epigenetics
-
FAAF Susan G Koman For the Cure Research Grants
-
Marsha Rivkin Center for Ovarian Cancer Research – Scientific Scholar Award
and Research Pilot Award.
December 7 – LOI National Brain Tumour Society Innovation Grant
December 15 – Canadian Cancer Society Knowledge to Action Grant Abstract Registration
December 17 – Alex’s Lemonade stand for pediatric brain cancer (YIA and epi grants)
-
CIHR Operating grants : Child and youth health
-
SickKids Foundation New Investigator Research Grant
-
Susan G Koman Breast Cancer grants
-
Terry Fox New Frontiers Program Grants
Studentships and Fellowships
November 22 – BMG internal deadline for Banting Fellowship
- Pediatric Oncology Group of Ontario Research Fellowship
November 30 – Clinical Trials Group AstraZeneca Fellowship
-
Clinical Trials Group Breast Cancer Fellowship
-
Clinical Trials Group Translational Research Fellowship
Dec 3 – Trudeau Foundation Doctoral Scholarship
Dec 4- US Dept of Defence Breast Cancer Research Post-Doc Fellowship pre-application (full
application due Dec 18)
Dec 14- American Society of Hematology Research Training for Fellows
MICB is supported by
Please see Eilean for more details. If you are applying through the University, FAAF’s are due
with ORS at least 1 week before the deadline.
As always, have a great research month.
Spencer Gibson
Director - Manitoba Institute of Cell Biology
MICB is supported by