Salt has long been an enigma in the taste field, because it elicits different responses depending on concentration. We love a little bit of salt (French fries, etc.) but really don’t like it at high concentrations (think about swallowing sea water). It has been proposed that this dual effect arises from activation of two taste cell types – a ‘low salt’ cell that produces attraction, and a ‘high salt’ cell that produces aversion. What we show is that in flies, salt affects all five...
When people ask me what I do for work, I tell them that I do research on research (in other words, I assess the impact of research). Research impact assessment is a complex and rapidly evolving field that is fraught with challenges and can be approached from many angles depending on your vantage point (e.g., researcher, university, funder, government). So…
In this manuscript we describe a novel approach in studying cancer biology – we explored genetic/epigenetic programming in fetal tissues to reveal extinct cellular processes that, when “re-awakened” in adult tissues, alters and ultimately disrupts the function of cancer stem cells. We happened upon this idea from work by Connie Eaves and others who had previously shown that the behavior of fetal hematopoietic stem cells...
Thousands of honey bee colonies arrive in the Fraser Valley’s blueberry fields every spring, but beekeepers are worried this crop may be harming their bees. My alarm only managed to announce one jolting ring before I slapped it off. The clock read 3:45 am, and there was no time to waste. Bleary-eyed, I threw together a thermos of coffee for…
Innovate BC, a Crown agency that connects local innovators with government funding, resources, and support, has awarded $944,600 through its Ignite program to spark the commercialization of technologies that will solve industry problems in the natural resources and applied sciences. Four BC research projects in diverse fields such as clean technology, forestry, and agriculture will split the funding. To date, Innovate BC…
Connie J. Eaves, Professor of Medical Genetics and Distinguished Scientist at the BC Cancer Agency, is among six individuals to be inducted into the 2019 Canadian Medical Hall of Fame. The recognition honours individuals whose contributions to medicine and the health sciences have led to extraordinary improvements in human health. Dr. Eaves is a world authority in stem cells of…
Genome BC is pleased to announce recipients of project funding through its Societal Issues Competition. The projects announced in this second round of funding will examine societal issues related to agrifood and natural resources. Inside every living thing is DNA — the blueprint of life. As life scientists develop innovations in genomic technologies, people and industries alike are changing how…
On behalf of Dr. Francois Bénard, Vice President Research and Dr. Pamela Hoodless, Director, Terry Fox Laboratory, Please join us in welcoming Dr. Florian Kuchenbauer, a newly appointed Clinician-Scientist, to the Terry Fox Laboratory and the Leukemia/Bone Marrow Transplant Program of BC. Florian received his MD degree in 2001 from the Ludwig-Maximilians University in Germany. He then completed his MD…
It has been well-established that aging in both humans and animals is associated with impairments in learning and memory. However, it is less clear how aging might affect integration of different memories to guide more complex forms of cognition (sometimes referred to as “executive functions”). In this study, we used aged rats to model these deficits, and found that aging was associated with impairments in different executive functions that require flexible use of different types of memories and are mediated by the frontal lobes of the brain.
The Morin laboratory uses genome sequencing and gene expression analysis to identify and characterize the somatic drivers of aggressive lymphomas and to identify biomarkers of treatment resistance. This particular study has two main findings that are each significant for different reasons. The first one is our description of recurrent mutations in the 3'UTR of the NFKBIZ gene. These represent a novel mechanism of inducing expression of an oncogene in lymphoma. The second main finding is our identification of high expression and copy number alterations affecting the FCGR2B gene...
