The 2019 Precision Medicine initiative (PRiME) Fellowship Awards were announced today and will provide financial support for 10 outstanding trainees from the labs of PRiME faculty members at the University of Toronto. 

Selected by PRiME’s Fellowship Committee, these high-calibre researchers bring a diverse range of projects that address PRiME’s mandate of identifying new disease targets, discovering novel targeted therapeutics, and developing next-generation diagnostics for precision medicine.

Launched in the spring of 2019, PRiME is a multi-faculty initiative that leverages U of T’s excellence in pharmaceutical sciences, medicine, physical sciences and engineering. Led by Shana Kelley, University Professor at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, PRiME bridges research from Pharmacy, the Faculty of Medicine, the Faculty of Arts & Science, and the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering.

The Fellows chosen for this award will undertake projects that combine the expertise of at least two faculty members, with many new cross-faculty collaborations included in this year’s cohort.

“One of the initial focuses of PRiME is to build a strong program for our trainees, including resources and support for both internal and external funding opportunities,” said Kelley. “Building a strong community of translational trainees will provide an excellent foundation for the initiative as we pursue a presence in the international research landscape.”

The 2019 awardees are listed below in alphabetical order:

• Noor Al-saden, Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Ray Reilly (Pharmacy) and Dr. Mitch Winnik (Arts & Science)

Project: Radiation nanomedicine for intraoperative treatment of Glioblastoma

• Rony Chidiac, Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Stephane Angers (Pharmacy) and Dr. Dev Sidhu (Medicine)

Project: Frizzled antibody agonists for modulation of endothelial cell permeability

• Angela Duong, PhD Student, Dr. Ana Andreazza, Dr. Liliana Attisano and Dr. Martin Beaulieu (Medicine)

Project: Cerebral organoids to investigate the role of mitochondrial dysfunction in neurotransmission and bipolar disorder

• Margot Karlikow, Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Keith Pardee (Pharmacy) and Dr. Gilbert Walker (Arts & Science)

Project: CRISPR-based sensors as diagnostic tools

• Anastasia Korolj, PhD Student, Dr. Milica Radisic, Dr. Axel Guenther (Applied Science & Engineering), and Dr. Ana Konvalinka (Medicine)

Project: Podocytes-on-chip for predicting kidney disease recurrence

• Jiabao Liu, Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Henry Krause (Medicine) and Dr. Carolyn Cummins (Pharmacy)

Project: Untargeted identification of natural modulators of orphan nuclear receptors

• Mark Mabanglo, Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Walid A. Houry (Medicine) and Dr. Robert A. Batey (Arts & Science)

Project: Targeting ClpP proteases for antibiotic drug development: Mapping the reaction pathway by time-resolved X-ray crystallography

• Jiaxi Peng, Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Aaron Wheeler and Dr. Hui Peng (Arts & Science)

Project: Analysis of neural stem cell aging by single-cell proteomics

• Yu-xi Xiao, PhD Student, Dr. Jason Moffat (Medicine) and Dr. Shana Kelley (Pharmacy)

Project: High-throughput, microfluidic repression and activation CRISPR screening

• Fei Xu, Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Eugenia Kumacheva and Dr. Alan Aspuru-Guzik (Arts & Science)

Project: Combining machine learning and microfluidic growth of cancer organoids for drug discovery

For more information on this year’s Fellowship winners, follow PRiME on Twitter and LinkedIn where profiles of each Fellow will be posted in the coming weeks.