Ontario Research Fund supports three QHS projects

News & Announcements | 25 Mar 2024

The Government of Ontario is supporting three Queen’s Health Sciences research projects through the Ontario Research Fund.

These projects – focused on neurological disorders, brain tumours, and cancer – received support for state-of-the-art equipment, technology, and hardware:

Faith Brennan (Biomedical and Molecular Sciences): Harnessing Macrophage Biology to Control Neuroinflammation – $150,000
Neurological disorders represent a major public health burden in Ontario. Neuroinflammation is a hallmark of all acute and chronic neurological injuries and diseases. Understanding how major inflammatory cells called macrophages contribute to tissue damage and poor functional recovery will accelerate the development of novel therapeutics. By establishing an Advanced Confocal Imaging Suite, Dr. Brennan’s research will build on the existing surgical, behavioural, molecular, and cellular facilities at Queen’s to enable the discovery and translation of strategies designed to reduce the burden of neurological disorders. This is a novel approach in Canada and has the potential to serve as a framework to develop interventions for other complex conditions such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, and autoimmune diseases.
Teresa Purzner (Surgery): Identifying Predictors of Recurrence and Developing Novel Therapies for Patients with Brain Tumours – $100,000
Dr. Purnzer is seeking to build new therapies that drive pediatric brain tumour cells to turn into becoming benign neurons.  Their team will be employing a high-throughput automated microscope to screen thousands of combinations of drugs, that would not be feasible manually, to identify which drug combinations are most effective. In addition, the Purzner lab is focused on building technology to identify, in real-time, areas that are high risk for early recurrence at the time of the initial surgery. If successful, the project will bring real-time personalized, precision surgery for patients in Ontario diagnosed with brain tumours for the very first time and will set the stage for Ontario to be a global leader in differentiation therapy as a novel approach to pediatric brain cancer.
Sebastien Talbot (Biomedical and Molecular Sciences): Neuro-Immunity in Cancer and Allergy – $250,000
Dr. Talbot aims to define the mechanisms and molecules that regulate the interplay between the immune and sensory nervous systems. The project will decipher how and which sub-population of sensory neurons controls innate and adaptive responses and develop new therapies for the resolution of inflammatory diseases. Using a fluorescent microscope, his team will build on existing facilities at Queen’s to enable the discovery and translation of strategies designed to reduce the burden of neurological and immunological conditions in Ontario. This new framework may also have the potential to develop interventions for other acute and chronic inflammatory disorders. Centering translational pipelines around state-of-the-art imaging infrastructure is a novel approach for Canada and will ensure Ontario leads the discoveries of new treatments for cancer and allergy.

For more information on this latest Ontario research investment, visit the Ontario Newsroom.

Read the full list of Queen’s researchers who received provincial funding in the original version of this story that appeared in The Gazette.

Ontario Research Fund supports three QHS projects

Related topics

Explore Our Stories