NEWS
Jump Start Workshop: How to do market research and why this is important?
Kicking off 2022, we would like to invite you to PRiME's Jump Start Market Research Workshop in Precision Medicine, taking place on Thursday, January 20th.
The goal of PRiME's Jump Start: Early-Stage Technology Development in Precision Medicine" Workshop Series is to provide a deep dive into all steps in development of pre-clinical drugs, devices and platforms. We plan to invite experts who will discuss their views on the importance of each step.
These workshops are open to all Trainees and Principal Investigators at UofT.
How to do market research and why this is important?
Thursday, January 20th, 2021 | 4:00 - 5:30 pm
During this session our speakers will present and discuss how to perform market research for your invention, what to consider in the process of analyzing the market and what is the added value of understanding the target market and competitive advantage of your discovery, invention and technology. We will feature speakers from NSERC, IPO, and Lab2Market who can advise on the process. This session aims to stimulate commercial thinking during research and discovery phase.
SPEAKERS:
Gary Svoboda
CEO, Adventus Research + Consulting Inc.
Gary Svoboda is Founder and CEO of Adventus Research + Consulting, a market research, strategy and management consultancy with offices in Guelph & Hamilton. His firm serves a wide range of clients with comprehensive market research/strategy and management consulting services. Gary has over 30 years of experience and has provided market research validation to hundreds of inventors, innovative companies and entrepreneurs launching new technologies, products and services. Prior to Adventus, he was a senior manager at the Canadian Innovation Centre in Waterloo. In addition to his market research experience, Gary Svoboda has served extensively as a corporate and industry spokesperson on the subject of invention, innovation and market research. Gary is a frequent conference presenter, and has appeared in over 100 print, radio and television spots over the past 20 years, including CBC Radio Noon, CBC News Channel, the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star.
Wesley Kosiba
Learning and Recruitment Specialist, Lab2Market
As the Learning and Recruitment Specialist for Canada’s new research commercialization program —Lab2Market, Wesley supports some of Canada’s most promising researchers in assessing the commercial potential of their innovations. With over four years of experience in the field of innovation and entrepreneurship, as a founder, program developer, and administrator at Ryerson, Wesley has situated himself at the forefront of research commercialization programming. Wesley is an alumnus of Ryerson’s Master of Engineering Innovation and Entrepreneurship program and a Lean Startup and Customer Discovery lecturer.
Marilee Krinsky
Senior Commercialization Manager- Biomedical Life Sciences, Innovations and Partnerships, UofT
Marilee Krinsky is a Senior Commercialization Manager in the Innovations and Partnerships Office, Vice President Research and Innovation, at the University of Toronto. Marilee has over fifteen years of experience in managing the evaluation and commercialization of scientific research opportunities within academic, hospital, government and industrial settings. In her role at IPO, she manages the commercialization plans for a large portfolio of diverse biomedical and life science-based technologies including intellectual property protection, technology marketing and the negotiation of partnership and licensing agreements. Marilee has extensive experience in preparing IPO and NSERC market assessment "Idea to Innovation" grants. She has successfully raised funding for large-scale research projects and has fostered partnerships with industry stakeholders. She has also facilitated and supported the creation and strategic management of several UofT start-up companies.
Rohan Alvares
Life Science Technology Analyst, UofT IPO
Rohan is a Life Science Technology Analyst at The Innovations & Partnerships Office (IPO) at the University of Toronto. He has a PhD. in Chemistry from the University of Toronto and has recently transitioned into positions related to technology transfer. At the IPO, he assists the Life Sciences team in the assessment of market and commercialization of emerging technologies. Part of his work involves analysing and performing due diligence on technologies related to therapeutics, medical devices, and diagnostics, while also assisting marketing efforts.
MODERATOR:
Milica Vukmirovic
Director, External Programs & Partnerships, PRiME
PRiME Trainees Awarded Industry-Partnered Fellowships
Dr. Louis-Philippe Picard (left), a postdoctoral fellow in Prof. Scott Prosser’s lab, and Dr. Jiaxi Peng (right), a postdoctoral fellow in Prof. Aaron Wheeler’s lab, are recipients of the PRiME Industry-Partnered Fellowship Program.
The PRiME research community is working on cutting edge technologies to advance drug discovery and therapeutic development. Partnerships and internships for trainees are a key step to supporting this aim, as well as to cultivating transferable skills in the next generation of scientists. Through the PRiME Industry-Partnered Fellowship Program, two exceptional trainees have been recipients of funding to further their research projects with industry collaborators.
Dr. Louis-Philippe Picard, a postdoctoral fellow in Prof. Scott Prosser’s lab in the Chemistry department at UTM, is working on a protocol for the rapid discovery of nanobodies as next generation therapeutics for G Protein-Coupled Receptors (GPCRs). In the Fall 2020 competition of the Mitacs Elevate Program , Dr. Picard was awarded a two year fellowship for this project. The work is an exciting hybrid of chemistry, molecular and cell biology, and animal work and the bi-weekly team meetings have been eye opening for both the academic and industry scientists involved.
In the span of a few months, the collaboration has completed an initial panning of first-generation molecules and is now refining the approach to find enhancers and inhibitors of signalling. Using the unique models developed at KisoJi Biotechnology, the team is hoping to demonstrate the application of bivalent nanobodies for a number of applications in GPCR pharmacology that were formerly the domain of small molecules only.
In the recent Spring 2021 Elevate competition, another PRiME trainee, Dr. Jiaxi Peng, was also awarded an Elevate fellowship. Dr. Peng is a postdoctoral fellow in Prof. Aaron Wheeler’s lab, previously funded through PRiME’s Fellowship Program in a collaboration with Profs. Hui Peng and Cindi Morshead to analyze neural stem cell aging through single-cell proteomics using the Wheeler lab’s DISCO (Digital microfluidic Isolation of Single Cells for -Omics) platform. In his current Elevate project with SCIEX , Dr. Peng aims to develop a next generation of DISCO for analyzing proteome dynamics and networks at the single cell level in stem cell reprogramming. These capabilities are crucial in understanding stem cell biology especially in the early stages of cell induction where protein expression and abundance are rapidly changing.
Prof. Wheeler commented, “I am thrilled that Dr. Peng is being recognized in this way – he is working on cutting-edge technology, and I look forward to seeing what we will do with our new collaborators at SCIEX. I am also grateful for how PRiME supported Dr. Peng and facilitated our connection to SCIEX through the MITACS Elevate Program”.
The Industry-Partnered Fellowship Program leverages funding from Mitacs Programs to help provide graduate students and postdoctoral fellows the opportunity to work with industry partners of PRiME. In addition to funding, the Elevate Program provides research management training for awardees. Further information about Mitacs suite of programs can be found here.
PRiME 3rd Annual Symposium
PRiME will be holding its 3rd Annual Symposium virtually on October 25th, 2021. This year's agenda includes exceptional keynote speakers from industry and academia and will also feature the diverse expertise of four new PRiME Faculty members. Additionally, Lightning Talks from our 2021 PRiME Fellows and an Innovation Showcase of technology platforms and companies will highlight some of the current research taking place within the PRiME community.
Registration is required.
Monday, October 25th – virtual * all times in EST
1:00 – 1:15 Opening & Welcome: Christine Allen, Interim Director, PRiME
Keynote Speaker:
1:15 – 2:00 Industry Keynote: Ray Deshaies, Senior Vice President, Global Research, Amgen
“The promise of multispecific molecular medicines”
2:00 – 2:30 Lightning Talks from 2021 PRiME Fellows
2:30 - 2:35 Break
PRiME Early Career Faculty Presentations:
2:35 – 2:50 Bowen Li, Assistant Professor, Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy
“Nanoparticulate Delivery Systems for RNA-based Vaccines and Gene Therapy”
2:50 - 3:05 Helen Tran, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Arts & Science
“Macromolecular Bioelectronics”
3:05 - 3:20 Rafael Montenegro Burke, Assistant Professor, Temerty Faculty of Medicine
3:20 - 3:35 Christopher Lawson, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering
“Retooling Microbiome Engineering for a Sustainable Future”
PRiME Innovation Showcase:
3:35 - 3:45 Nanology Labs (Mohammad Ali Amini, CEO; Shirley Wu, Co-Founder)
3:45 - 3:55 LSK Technologies (Seray Cicek, CEO; Keith Pardee, Co-Founder)
3:55 - 4:05 AntlerA (Somasekar Seshagiri, CEO; Sachdev Sidhu & Stephane Angers, Co-Founders)
4:05 – 4:10 Break
Keynote Speaker:
4:10 – 4:55 Academic Keynote: Carolyn Bertozzi, Professor, Baker Family Director, Stanford ChEM-H
“Therapeutic Opportunities in Glycoscience”
4:55 - 5:00 Closing remarks
2021 PRiME Fellows Announced
PRiME Fellows represent the next generation of scientific leaders, poised to tackle some of the biggest challenges in health and disease. The 2021 cohort of awardees are exceptional trainees working on projects that combine expertise across the four PRiME Faculties, applying molecular biology, genomics, computational biology, and bioengineering towards diagnostic and therapeutic solutions. This year, PRiME Fellows are spearheading projects in screening for drugs against cancers and pathogens, building preclinical tools to model tissue dynamics, and designing nanotechnology and diagnostics for disease.
The annual PRiME Fellowship competition provides funding to PhD students or postdoctoral fellows with bold ideas that enable high-risk, high-reward research. Projects are collaborative, with co-supervision by PRiME investigators across the Faculties of Arts & Science, Applied Science & Engineering, Medicine, and Pharmacy. Fellows will be provided stipend support by PRiME for one year and assisted in leveraging their scientific progress to obtain further funding for the next stage of research activity in the lab.
The 2021 awardees are listed below, in alphabetical order:
Dustin Duncan, Postdoctoral Fellow
Supervisors: Drs. Leah Cowen (Medicine) & Rob Batey (Arts & Science)
Title: Optimization of Tri-substituted Indazoles as Inhibitors of Fungal Respiration
Emily Gilbert, Postdoctoral Fellow
Supervisors: Drs. Cindi Morshead (Medicine) & Molly Shoichet (Engineering)
Title: Novel approaches to manipulate neuroinflammation in a pre-clinical model of Multiple Sclerosis
Ingrid Grozavu, PhD Candidate
Supervisors: Drs. Igor Stagljar (Medicine) & Michael Ohh (Medicine)
Title: Using the MaMTH-DS and SIMPL-DS assays to screen AI-derived inhibitors targeting the oncogene KRAS G12D
Yechen Hu, Postdoctoral Fellow
Supervisors: Drs. Aaron Wheeler (Arts & Science) & Penney Gilbert (Engineering)
Title: Multi-Omics Analysis of Muscle Stem Cell Induced Muscle Disease
Shahrzad Jahanshahi, Postdoctoral Fellow
Supervisors: Drs. Walid Houry (Medicine) & Alan Cochrane (Medicine)
Title: Discovery of Broad-Spectrum Anti-Coronovirus Therapeutics
Rick Lu, PhD Candidate
Supervisors: Drs. Milica Radisic (Engineering) & Michael Sefton (Engineering)
Title: Peptide therapeutics for SARS-CoV-2 induced heart failure testing in vascularized perfusable heart-on-a-chip system
Zhen Qin, PhD Candidate
Supervisors: Drs. Xinyu Liu (Engineering) & Keith Pardee (Pharmacy)
Title: Miniaturized RT-LAMP Paper-based device for Point-of-Care COVID Viral RNA Detection
Tudor Radu, PhD Candidate
Supervisors: Drs. Patrick Gunning (Arts & Science) & Scott Prosser (Arts & Science)
Title: Discovery of a Novel Allosteric Selective Fusion Kinase Inhibitor for the Treatment of a Rare Liver Cancer
Wendy Wang, Postdoctoral Fellow
Supervisors: Drs. Leo Chou (Engineering) & Christine Allen (Pharmacy)
Title: DNA nanodevices for enhanced immune targeting of the tumor microenvironment
Nila Wu, PhD Candidate
Supervisors: Drs. Alison McGuigan (Engineering) & Cheryl Arrowsmith (Medicine)
Title: Targeting Macrophage-Driven Tumour Cell Regrowth after Chemotherapy Treatment in a 3D Engineered Tumour
PRiME Connaught Global Challenge Series: Symposium with ETH Zurich
PRiME is hosting the third installment of the Connaught Global Challenge Series introducing our partnership with ETH Zurich. This event will feature investigators from both PRiME and ETH Zurich who are working at the forefront of disease-in-a-dish/on-a-chip models and engineering molecular structure for imaging. Registration for this event is required and additional information along with the full program is provided below.
For those who missed the previous symposia in this series, you can view the PRiME-UCSF and the PRiME-HUJI sessions on our YouTube channel.
NOTE: This event has already taken place. You can watch this seminar series on PRiME’s YouTube channel.
PRiME - ETH Zurich Mini Symposium
Models & Tools for Next-Generation Precision Medicine
Monday, September 27, 2021 - 9:00 am to 12:00 pm
9:00 – 9:15 Shana Kelley - Director, PRiME
Introduction to PRiME and the Connaught Global Challenge Program
Disease-in-a-dish/on-a-chip models
9:15 – 9:35 Cornelia Halin - Professor, Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences, ETH Zurich
"Blocking leukocyte migration for the treatment of corneal transplant rejection”
9:35 – 9:55 Milica Radisic - Professor, Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering, UofT
“Organ-on-a-chip models of COVID-19”
9:55 – 10:15 Klaus Eyer - Assistant Professor, Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences, ETH Zurich
“From Bedside to Bench and back – the value of simple model systems and high-resolution single-cell analysis”
10:15 – 10:35 Group Discussion and Q&A
10:35 – 10:40 Break
Engineering molecular structure for imaging
10:40 – 11:00 Ray Reilly - Professor, Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, UofT; Director, Centre for Pharmaceutical Oncology
“Molecular Imaging of the Delivery of Trastuzumab to Brain Metastases in Patients with HER2-Positive Breast Cancer Enhanced by MR-Guided Focused Ultrasound”
11:00 – 11:20 Roger Schibli – Associate Professor, Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences, ETH Zurich; Head, Center for Radiopharmaceutical Science (CRS),
“Nuclear theragnostics from bench-to-bedside”
11:20 – 11:40 Gang Zheng - Associate Research Director & Senior Scientist, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre
“Porphysome nanotheranostics: from discovery toward the first-in-human”
11:40 – 12:00 Group Discussion and Q&A
PRiME and Medicine By Design Co-Host the Cell and Gene Therapies Innovations Showcase
Cell and gene therapies have significant potential to treat the most debilitating of chronic diseases, and will be hugely transformative for the pharmaceutical and biotech industry. In July, PRiME partnered with Medicine by Design to host a virtual Cell and Gene Therapies Innovation Showcase, highlighting novel strategies and enabling technologies poised to advance the field. This two-day event featured talks from world renowned researchers from the University of Toronto (UofT) and its affiliated hospitals, Canadian industry leaders, and exceptional trainees from our local ecosystem who represent the next generation of trailblazing scientists in the field of regenerative and precision cell-based medicines.
The first day of the event focused on innovative cell and gene therapies currently in development, and the diversity of strategies being employed by Canadian scientists in this space. The potential for cell reprogramming in tissue-specific regeneration took the spotlight. Dr. Shinichiro Ogawa (Affiliate Scientist, the McEwen Stem Cell Institute) spoke about his work developing targeted stem cell-based therapies for liver diseases, while Dr. Maryam Faiz (Assistant Professor, Department of Surgery, UofT) talked about direct lineage reprogramming of mature cells for brain repair. Dr. Christoph Haller (Cardiovascular Surgeon, The Hospital for Sick Children; and PhD Candidate, Michael Laflamme’s Lab, UofT) shifted focus to the heart, and demonstrated the potential of stem cell therapy for use in the preservation, recovery, and regeneration of right ventricular function.
Immunotherapies were also highlighted, as Daniel Wang (PhD Candidate, UofT) presented the Kelley lab’s technology for microfluidic targeting of highly potent tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes. Quinn Matthews (MSc Candidate, UofT) discussed the Pardee lab’s platform for automated functionalization of lipid nanoparticles for CAR T cell therapy.
A leader in engineering T cells is the Canadian biotech company, Notch Therapeutics. The company’s Co-Founder and Director of Research, Dr. Shreya Shukla, shared the company’s recent developments with the audience. Platform technologies for cell therapies is also a focus for panCELLa and Andras Nagy (Founder and Director) described how the company is leading the way in developing safe off-the-shelf therapeutic cells.
On Day 2, enabling technologies that support cell and gene therapy development were spotlighted. In vitro systems that can model function are important tools in this respect to help bridge preclinical work and clinical trials. Dr. Penney Gilbert (Associate Professor, Institute of Biomedical Engineering, UofT) and her group have been working on pre-clinical culture models of human skeletal muscle function, while Dr. Liliana Attisano (Professor, Donnelly Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research, UofT) has been developing human organoids for vascularization.
The growth and differentiation of stem cells for reprogramming is another area of attention. Dr. Rony Chidiac (Postdoctoral Fellow, UofT), a 2019 PRiME Fellow, shared his work in Stephane Angers’ lab on therapeutic antibodies activating the Wnt signalling for regeneration. Dr. Maria Abou Chakra (Research Associate, UofT) uses a computational approach to modelling differentiation and shared her work on the development of a virtual cell using computational algorithms.
Our company spotlights for the second day focused on ExCellThera and Aspect Biosystems. Dr. Maude Dumont-Lagacé (Associate Director of R&D and Special Projects, ExCellThera) discussed the company’s UM171 technology for cord blood expansion that accelerates immune reconstitution and increases donor availability, while Dr. Sam Wadsworth (Chief Scientific Officer, Aspect Biosystems) described microfluidic 3D bioprinting for designing and building human tissues as the next generation tool for cell therapies.
The event was a great opportunity to learn about the exciting research happening locally and nationally. It was also a chance for investigators and trainees of both PRiME and Medicine by Design to showcase their work and understand the potential partnership opportunities that exist in the ecosystem.
2019 PRiME Fellows honoured with external funding awards
The PRiME Fellowships have consistently been awarded to an exceptional group of talented, young scientists working on bold interdisciplinary ideas since 2019. It is no surprise that two of these researchers, Anastasia Korolj and Rony Chidiac, have recently been honoured with additional accolades, recognizing their hard work and significant contribution to their respective fields of science.
Anastasia Korolj is a PhD student in Prof. Milica Radisic’s laboratory in the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering. In 2019, she was awarded a PRiME Fellowship for a project co-supervised by Prof. Axel Guenther and Prof. Ana Konvalinka, focused on developing podocytes-on-chip technology to predict recurrence of kidney disease. Earlier this month, Anastasia was awarded one of the 2021 Schmidt Science Fellowships. This prestigious award is delivered by Schmidt Futures, in partnership with the Rhodes Trust, to early-career scientists committed to harnessing interdisciplinary science for positive impact on the world. Anastasia credits the PRiME Fellowship for supporting her development toward this achievement. “The PRiME fellowship exposed me in an intimate way to the diverse research within UofT,” she says. “[It] empowered me to grow my skills in communicating my research with a wide audience, developing collaborative projects, and broadening my research direction alongside the multi-level PRiME community who were all motivated and talented individuals that inspired me.” With this award, Anastasia joins a small, esteemed group of only 84 Fellows since 2017. She will be using both engineered tissues and patient samples to unlock early disease detection by applying chaos mathematics to personalized medicine.
Another 2019 Fellow, Dr. Rony Chidiac, was recently awarded a 2021 Vision Grant, providing $200,000 USD as a two-year Postdoctoral Fellowship Award, from the BrightFocus Foundation for his work on novel antibody-based agonist for neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD). Bright Focus is a non-profit organization based in the US that funds outstanding research conducted worldwide in Alzheimer’s disease, macular degeneration, and glaucoma. This project builds on the work Rony, a postdoctoral fellow in Prof. Stephane Angers’ lab in the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, began in collaboration with Prof. Sachdev Sidhu developing Frizzled antibody agonists for the modulation of endothelial cell permeability, funded through a PRiME Fellowship. Blood retinal barrier dysfunction is associated with multiple ocular diseases such as diabetic retinopathy and macular degeneration causing impaired vision or blindness. The selective Frizzled-4 antibody-based agonist developed by the Angers and Sidhu team shows high efficacy in normalizing defective retinal angiogenesis and barrier function, providing a novel therapeutic strategy for eye diseases. This study was recently published in EMBO molecular medicine. The BrightFocus Foundation funding will allow Dr. Chidiac to study the therapeutic potential of the novel molecule in models related to nAMD.
PRiME is proud to have contributed funding to these promising scientists through support of their collaborative research at the University of Toronto and we look forward to the next phase of their careers. We truly believe in supporting the next generation of interdisciplinary researchers that are poised to make significant contributions to our biggest challenges in medicine and healthcare. Look for the 2021 cohort of PRiME Fellows to be announced in early September.
The PRiME TCAI Team Makes Significant Progress on COVID-19 Research
In April 2020, the University of Toronto was able to quickly mobilize almost $9M through the Toronto COVID-19 Action Fund (TCAI) to support over 30 high impact research projects in the fight against the global COVID-19 pandemic. Many of the members of PRiME’s Task Force on Advanced Diagnostics and Therapeutics for COVID-19 were among the recipients of this funding, and have worked tirelessly over the last year to develop novel diagnostic and therapeutic solutions to control this and future infection outbreaks.
Despite the challenges brought on by the pandemic – including, but not limited to, lab shutdowns and unstable access to essential reagents – our PRiME TCAI-funded researchers have made significant and exciting progress on their COVID-19 projects, with an unprecedented pace of development in this short period towards real world solutions. We have highlighted, below, their achievements in the past year.
Dr. Rob Batey
Dr. Batey has worked with other investigators to establish the Chemistry COVID-19 Core Facility, which will provide services and direction in synthetic and medicinal chemistry and small molecule design for COVID-19 projects in the research community.
Dr. Warren Chan
The Chan lab is using tiny light-emitting nanocrystals, known as quantum dots, in a portable, rapid diagnostic device to detect genetic components of SARS-CoV-2 in less than an hour. They are collaborating with Drs. Samira Mubareka (Sunnybrook Research Institute) and Jonathan Gubbay (Public Health Ontario) to test the device on patient swab samples, as well as fellow PRiME investigator, Dr. Gary Bader, to track how the virus is evolving so that the test can be adjusted to new variants of concern.
The test is currently still being optimized and the team will start validating the technology using patient samples. The Chan group is developing other COVID-19 technologies, including a serological test that is complete with clinical evaluation, as well as other colorimetric-based COVID-19 tests that are currently being clinically evaluated. They are also broadening to other respiratory infections, such as influenza. With all of these new diagnostics in development, the Chan lab will be partnering with Luna Nanotech, which Dr. Chan had started 4 years ago, towards commercialization. Dr. Chan is also discussing mass manufacturing of the devices and reagents with a company in Korea.
Dr. Leo Chou
With supply chain shortages plaguing the early COVID response last spring, Dr. Chou and his group want to make viral testing more streamlined and faster by using short, synthetic DNA strands in a one-step, enzyme-free test that can be deployed in a point-of-care setting. This technology is based on self-assembly of customized DNA molecules in the presence of SARS-CoV-2 viral RNA.
In partnership with the Leibniz Institute for Polymer Research Dresden and Luna Nanotech, the Chou lab received an NSERC Alliance grant for the development of this technology.
Dr. Alan Cochrane & Dr. Walid Houry
Small molecule inhibitors of virus replication are essential to treat those infected or to serve as prophylactics for those who will be exposed. Targeting cellular pathways essential to multiple strains of coronavirus can help identify therapeutic agents against current and future infectious agents. To accomplish this, a rapid screen with a library of small molecule modulators of RNA processing was performed by the Dr. Alan Cochrane’s group, and another screen of ~400 compounds targeting molecular chaperones performed by Dr. Walid Houry’s lab. To date, screening efforts have identified a handful of promising compounds that suppress SARS-CoV-2 replication.
While validation work continues, the important preclinical data from both groups is being prepared for publication. Additionally, Dr. Cochrane’s group has filed a patent on one of these compounds, and the team is currently in discussions with Virocarb, a biotech company, to obtain further funding for preclinical testing of these compounds. Dr. Houry’s group is also in the process of validating, characterizing and exploring the therapeutic potential of the lead candidates from the screen.
Dr. Aled Edwards
Dr. Edwards is leading the charge on the Toronto Open Access COVID-19 Protein Manufacturing Centre. Leveraging funding from TCAI, along with Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) and BioZone, the protein purification team at the centre produces any of the 25 SARS-CoV-2 viral proteins for research use, free of charge and restrictions, for any Canadian business or academic. This has been an important resource for the local research community as investigators working on everything from disease biology to diagnostics to therapeutics have access to these viral components. The progress also includes development of assays to screen SARS-CoV-2 nsp14 and nsp16 protein targets, with two manuscripts published in two publications in SLAS Discovery (here and here) and one in bioRxiv.
Dr. Xinyu Liu
Dr. Liu’s team has been developing point-of-care technology for profiling the IgG and IgM antibody status of COVID-19 patients. The group recently developed a portable paper-based microfluidic platform capable of running an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) in an automated, rapid (<25 min), “sample-in-answer-out” fashion. This portable platform has now been adapted to assess antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in human patient serum.
This work has already produced one publication in Biosensors and Bioelectronics, with a second to be submitted, and has also spurred collaborations with Dr. Eleftherios Diamandis (Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute) to work on COVID-19 rapid antigen testing, and Dr. Nicole Li-Jessen (McGill University) for rapid testing of protein biomarkers for laryngopharyngeal reflux.
Dr. Shana Kelley
The Kelley lab set out to develop a single-use device for SARS-CoV-2 detection to enable decentralized testing. This device would not require any external reagents, and thus relieve the bottlenecks that limit patient testing.
The group has made rapid advances and has published this work in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Additionally, the handheld, reagent-free testing device to help detect COVID-19 as well as monitoring long-term disease progression is under further development by Arma Biosciences, a new Toronto-based start-up. Arma Biosciences has been part of the Creative Destruction Lab (CDL) program and was 1 of 3 winning teams out of 40 competitors at the 2020 Pitch Perfect Competition held by University of Toronto’s Health Innovation Hub (H2i). The team has also been awarded NIH funding for the further development of the sensing system.
Dr. Jason Moffat
The Moffat team has been using CRISPR to screen for gene-encoded host dependency factors on human cells for SARS-CoV-2 infection and replication. In doing so, they aim to find existing approved drugs that target these protein regulators to be repurposed for COVID-19 treatment. The screen has been completed on multiple human cell lines and a manuscript is currently in preparation.
Dr. Keith Pardee
The Pardee group has been working on PCR-free nucleic acid-based diagnostics that can serve as alternatives to current lab tests. These tests rely on a distinct set of reagents that are not in short supply, and the technology has already been extensively validated and field tested during the Zika outbreak.
This project has already resulted in two publications in BMC Biology and Nature Communications. A company, En Carta, has also been established to further develop and distribute the technology. En Carta has successfully completed the Creative Destruction Lab program and is planning to scale up the approach.
Dr. Igor Stagljar
The Stagljar lab has been working on a novel protein complementation-based assay for the serological detection of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 in those who have recovered from COVID-19. The approach relies on complementation of proteins to antibodies, which then results in luciferase emission that can be read on a luminometer. The group worked with Sunnybrook Health Centre and Canadian Blood Services to develop their assay on blood samples of former COVID-19 patients, optimizing their test to high sensitivity and specificity for IgG antibodies. Dr. Stagljar is further validating his test by collaborating with Dr. Prabhat Jha (Centre for Global Health Research, St. Michael’s Hospital) on a study assessing long term SARS-CoV-2 immunity in thousands of Canadians, and Dr. Alison McGeer (Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute), who is studying the effectiveness and duration of immunity in people after vaccination.
Dr. Stagljar’s assay has been published in Nature Communications, and profiled in the Globe and Mail. He is currently looking for industry partners to scale up, distribute, and make his test available to wider community.
PRiME announces a Pan-Canadian Biomedical Innovation Showcase featuring research and industry leaders
2020 was an unprecedented year – a global pandemic stopped the world in its tracks. In 2021, we begin our recovery as an economy and a society as a worldwide vaccination effort is rolled out. The importance of biomedical innovation and the biotech sector has never been more evident: the vaccine needed to reopen our societies and economies was quickly developed by a cohort of groups in the biopharmaceutical sector and shown to be effective on a timeline that defied any historical precedent. In Canada, the accompanying momentum in the sector accelerated several companies to the public markets. The Canadian biotech industry took an exponential step forward in 2020 and will continue to grow at an unprecedented rate with continued investment and support. Growing our talent base and creating a constellation of new companies will be essential to realize the economic development and societal impact that the growth of this industry can deliver.
On February 17th, we will hold a virtual Pan-Canadian Showcase to highlight the largest centres accelerating biomedical innovation in our country – Toronto/Hamilton, Vancouver and Montreal. These regions are delivering new discoveries and providing the foundation for new companies and the next generation of biomedical breakthroughs. The world-class science being advanced across the country is laying the groundwork for the development of new treatments for disease, the ability to diagnose disease quickly and accurately, as well as elucidating the biology that underlies human disease. The highly skilled scientific talent being developed gives us a homegrown base of leadership for the biotech companies of tomorrow. It is imperative, however, that we seek new mechanisms to transform our discoveries into companies and retain this talent pool as we continue to grow biotech in Canada. By bolstering biomedical research and using these discoveries to increase start-up activity in Canada, jobs will be created, talented Canadians will have career advancement opportunities, and our economy will reap the benefits. And the next time we are faced with a global pandemic, we will be ready with significantly increased capacity at all levels - from the R&D needed to quickly create anti-infectives and vaccines, to the biomanufacturing infrastructure needed to allow us to produce life-saving medicines.
This showcase will also feature a group of Canada’s successful entrepreneurs and investors. During a panel discussion, CEOs of the latest Canadian biotechs to IPO (Carl Hansen of AbCellera and Lloyd Segal from Repare Therapeutics) and prominent investors (Jerel Davis of Versant Ventures and Jessica Chutter from Morgan Stanley) will discuss their views on what is needed to further build momentum in the sector. Andrew Casey, the CEO of BIOTECanada, will lead this important discussion.
We are excited to present this showcase that will feature opportunities for dialogue & discussion and hope you will join us!
This event has already taken place. You can watch this seminar series by clicking the button below.
Wednesday February 17th, 2021
1:30 – 5:00 pm ET (virtual)
1:30 – 1:55 Shana Kelley, University of Toronto
“Tackling Disease with Precision Therapeutics and Diagnostics: PRiME and the GTA Ecosystem”
1:55 – 2:15 Pieter Cullis, University of British Columbia
“BC as an Emerging Biopharmaceutical Powerhouse: Therapeutic Antibodies and COVID-19 Vaccines”
2:15 – 2:35 Gerry Wright, McMaster University
“The Global Nexus Initiative: Addressing Current and Future Biological Threats with Expertise and Evidence”
2:35 – 2:55 Philippe Gros, McGill University
“Biomedical Innovation at McGill: Institutional overview and local context”
2:55 – 3:15 Michel Bouvier, University of Montreal
“Successfully Translating Academic Discoveries and Expertise into Therapeutic Solutions for Patients; the IRIC/IRICoR Model”
3:15 – 3:45 Group Discussion
3:45 – 4:00 BREAK
4:00 – 5:00 Panel Discussion: How do we turn more Canadian biomedical breakthroughs into successful Canadian companies?
Andrew Casey, CEO, BIOTECanada (moderator)
Jessica Chutter, Managing Director, Biotech Investment Banking, Morgan Stanley
Jerel Davis, Managing Partner, Versant Ventures
Carl Hansen, Founder and CEO, AbCellera
Lloyd Segal, CEO, Repare Therapeutics
PRiME Connaught Global Challenge Series: Symposium with The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Following the success of last December’s PRiME-UCSF joint symposium, PRiME is hosting the second instalment of the Connaught Global Challenge Series introducing our partnership with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI). This will be a three-part event, featuring investigators from both UofT and HUJI who are working at the forefront of protein engineering, molecular diagnostics, and drug delivery. Additional information along with the full program for each session is provided below.
Late last year, PRiME kicked off its new global partnerships program, funded by a Connaught Global Challenge Award, with a two-day session, featuring both PRiME and UCSF investigators conducting research in proteostasis and high-throughput technologies. These stimulating discussions not only showcased the wealth of talent and innovation from both institutions, but also provided a forum to identify potential collaborative efforts between individual investigators across the two sites. It is with these partnerships, and with an international and inter-disciplinary approach to sharing knowledge and insights, that we will aim to advance biomedical innovation.
For those who missed the PRiME-UCSF symposium, the entire event can be viewed on PRiME’s YouTube channel at this link.
Program details are below. Please note that advanced registration is required for attendance.
NOTE: This event has already taken place. You can watch this seminar series on PRiME’s YouTube channel.
PRiME - HUJI Mini-Symposium
Wednesday February 24th, March 3rd & March 10th, 2021
All days start at 9:00am EST & 4:00pm IST; separate registration is required for each event in the series.
All times indicated are EST. Event will be held online.
Wednesday, February 24th
Session 1: Protein Design, Protein-Drug Interactions, and Protein Engineering
9:00 – 9:15 Introduction to PRiME and the Connaught Global Challenge Program
9:15 – 9:35 Amiram Goldblum, HUJI
Multitargeting: discovering single molecules that simultaneously hit a few disease targets
9:35 – 9:55 Frank Sicheri, UofT
Engineering and characterization of a PROTAC against oncogenic BRAF kinase
10:00 – 10:20 Julia Shifman, HUJI
Engineering of protein-based drugs against cancer and COVID-19”
10:20 – 10:40 Stephane Angers, UofT
Promoting stem cell activity using proximity-inducing antibodies for tissue regeneration
10:40 – 11:00 Ora Furman-Schueler, HUJI
Accurate structural characterization of peptide-mediated interactions as a starting point for drug design
11:00 – 11:20 Scott Prosser, UofT
NMR studies of the Adenosine A2A Receptor G protein complex: Addressing the Mechanism of Activation of GPCRs
11:20 – 12:00 Questions & open discussion
Wednesday, March 3rd
Session 2: Molecular Diagnostics
9:00 – 9:15 Introduction to PRiME and the Connaught Global Challenge Program
9:15 – 9:35 Eylon Yavin, HUJI
FIT-PNAs: RNA sensors in humans and parasites
9:35 – 9:55 Keith Pardee, UofT
RESPONDING TO OUTBREAKS: An emerging role for synthetic biology and low-cost hardware
10:00 – 10:20 Galia Blum, HUJI
Disease detection using protease activity probes
10:20 – 10:40 Aaron Wheeler, UofT
Digital Microfluidic Systems for Serological Surveillance in the Field
10:40 – 11:00 Katy Margulis, HUJI
Mass spectrometry imaging in therapeutics
11:00 – 11:20 Warren Chan, UofT
COVID-19 diagnostics via quantum dot barcodes
11:20 – 12:00 Questions & open discussion
Wednesday, March 10th
Session 3: Drug Delivery
9:00 – 9:15 Introduction to PRiME and the Connaught Global Challenge Program
9:15 – 9:35 Ofra Benny, HUJI
Nanomedicine approach for personalized medicine in cancer
9:35 – 9:55 Molly Shoichet, UofT
Affinity-controlled Protein Delivery Strategies
10:00 – 10:20 Abraham J. Domb, HUJI
Injectable Biodegradable Polymers for Regional therapy
10:20 – 10:40 Christine Allen, UofT
Integration of AI into Drug Formulation Development
10:40 – 11:00 Gershon Golomb, HUJI
siRNA lipid nanoparticles for the treatment of herpes simplex
11:00 – 11:20 Omar Khan, UofT
Immunobioengineering through Applied Chemistry
11:20 – 12:00 Questions & open discussion