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February 21, 2012
FROM THE LABORATORY TO THE PATIENT:
FIRST CANADIAN SYMPOSIUM ON HEPATITIS C TO BE HELD IN
MONTREAL
Montreal will host the first ever Canadian
Symposium on the Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) on February 23 at the
Hotel Hilton
Bonaventure. Chaired by Dr. Naglaa Shoukry of the University of
Montreal Hospital
Research Centre, this symposium will bring together around
200
researchers and clinicians from across Canada and around the world.
The goal is
to increase interactions and exchanges between researchers,
healthcare
professionals and community organizations to develop more effective
strategies to
meet the challenges of preventing and treating Hepatitis
C.
CRCHUM researchers have spearheaded the development of many
important discoveries
in this area:
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February 13, 2012
THE CRCHUM RECEIVES $2.8 M FOR RESEARCH INTO CANCER PREVENTION
RESEARCH
A team led by Dr Jack Siemiatycki of the University of
Montreal Hospital Research Centre (CRCHUM) with Dr Michael Pollak
of McGill University has received the go ahead for a five-year
project to develop and apply CANJEM, a job-exposure matrix, to
discover occupational causes of lung, brain, ovarian and colorectal
cancer.
With $2.8 M in funding from the Cancer Research Society and the
Fonds de Recherche Québec – Santé, the
team hopes to make important strides in cancer prevention by
focusing on modifiable causes of cancer, particularly those
encountered in the workplace (e.g., asbestos, radon gas,
formaldehyde).
≥≥≥
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February 7, 2012
A TEAM OF CRCHUM RESEARCHERS PAVES THE WAY FOR IMPROVING TREATMENT
FOR TYPE 2
DIABETES
In a study published last week in the prestigious Proceedings of
the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, a
team led by Dr. Vincent Poitout of the CHUM Research Centre has
made an important step forward in understanding how insulin
secretion is regulated in the body. This discovery has important
implications for drugs currently in development to treat Type 2
diabetes, a disease which is diagnosed every 10 seconds somewhere
throughout the world.
≥≥≥
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February 7, 2012
RECIPIENTS OF CRCHUM CHALLENGE GRADUATE
AWARDS
The CRCHUM is pleased to announce the receipients of the
CRCHUM Challenge
awards.
These awards were made possible through funds raised during the
CRCHUM Challenge. ≥≥≥
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December 18, 2011
THE 14th CRCHUM STUDENT CONGRESS, HELD ON DECEMBER 13, WAS A
RESOUNDING SUCCESS
The 14th CRCHUM Student Congress, held on December 13, was a
resounding success.
More than 160 CRCHUM students presented their research projects.
The event was
attended by over 300 people.
Twenty students and postdoctoral researchers were awarded
scholarship supplements
and 16 students received awards from the University of
Montreal’s biomedical and
molecular biology programs. Several students also received prize
for oral
presentations or posters through Grand Challenges ≥≥≥
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December 1st, 2011
A BREAKTHROUGH IN PINPOINTING PROTECTIVE MECHANISMS IN MULTIPLE
SCLEROSIS:
THE IMPORTANCE OF THE SONIC HEDGEHOG PROTEIN REVEALED BY A TEAM OF
CRCHUM RESEARCHERS
In an article published today in the prestigious journal Science, a
team of researchers led by Dr Alexander Prat and postgraduate
fellow Jorge
Alvarez at the University of Montreal Hospital Research Centre
(CRCHUM) sheds light on how the blood-brain-barrier (BBB) works to
prevent the incursion of the immune system
into
the brain. “Our findings provide a better understanding of
the mechanisms used by the brain in mounting a natural defence
against immune system aggression, as is the case
in
Multiple Sclerosis” explains Dr
Prat.
≥≥≥
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November 7, 2011
A TROJAN HORSE IN THE FIGHT AGAINST HIV/AIDS:
CRCHUM RESEARCHER RECEIVES FUNDING FROM THE BILL & MELINDA
GATES FONDATION
The CRCHUM announced today
that one of its researchers will receive funding of US
$100,000
through Grand Challenges Explorations, an initiative created by the
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
that enables researchers worldwide to test unorthodox ideas that
address persistent health
and development challenges. Andrés Finzi will pursue an
innovative global health research project, titled
“Reverse Fusion: a new approach to eradicate HIV/AIDS”
to deliver toxic genes to HIV-infected cells and
eliminate them.≥≥≥
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November 2, 2011
NOMINATION OF DR. WILLIAM D. FRASER, AS ASSOCIATE SCIENTIFIC
DIRECTOR,
CLINICAL
RESEARCH
It is with great pleasure that the CRCHUM announces the nomination
of Dr. William D. Fraser, MD, MSc,
FRCSC, as Associate Scientific Director, Clinical Research. Dr.
Fraser nomination will take effect in
November 2011.
Dr. Fraser role will be to promote the CRCHUM as the first choice
for clinical research and
to advantageously position the CRCHUM within major Canadian and
Quebec clinical research strategies,
especially with regard to the CIHR’s Strategy for
Patient-Oriented Research and Quebec’s Research and
Innovation Strategy. ≥≥≥
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November 2, 2011
LAUREATS OF THE DÉFI CRCHUM PROFESSIONAL TRAINING
AWARDS
The CRCHUM is pleased to announce the laureats of the Défi
CRCHUM professional
training awards.
The funds for these awards were made possible through the
sums
collected during the Défi CRCHUM.
The Défi CRCHUM professional training awards are intended to
help members of its
personnel defray the
costs of training activities, participation in conferences
or
congresses and other professional training
activities. ≥≥≥
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October 14, 2011
A NEW INITIATIVE SEEKS TO CHANGE THE WAY OVARIAN CANCER IS
DIAGNOSED AND
MANAGED WORLDWIDE
Women throughout the world will benefit from a new,
pan‐Canadian Terry Fox Research
Institute (TFRI)
initiative that aims to change the way in which ovarian cancer
is
diagnosed and managed. TFRI and the
Canadian Partnership Against Cancer are
providing
a total of $5‐million in funding for a five‐year,
multi‐site Ovarian Cancer
Pan‐Canadian Program called COEUR. The program will identify
new
biomarkers to
predict and treat this relatively rare but deadly form of cancer,
which will result
in the use
and application of current and new drugs more effectively for
patients ≥≥≥
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JULY 6, 2011
URBAN CHILDREN ARE HEALTHIER COMMUTERS THAN RURAL TEENS
The children most likely to walk or cycle to school live in urban
areas with a single parent, and in an
economically disadvantaged home, according to survey results that
were published in Pediatrics today
by Dr. Roman Pabayo of the University of Montreal Hospital Research
Centre and the university’s
Department of Social and preventive
medicine. Pabayo’s study is unique in that it follows the
same group
of children as they age throughout the school years, and it shows
that children increasingly use “active
transport” to travel to school until they reach ten or eleven
years of age, at which point the trend then
reverses ≥≥≥
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May 16, 2011
BREAST CANCER: A NEW TREATMENT AVENUE IDENTIFIED AT THE CRCHUM AND
THE PETER
MACCALLUM CANCER CENTRE
Researchers at the CRCHUM and the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in
Australia have identified a new
avenue for treating breast cancer.
In 20 to 30% of breast cancer patients, the over-expression of a
particular
protein (human epidermal growth factor-2) is the main cause of
the proliferation of cancer cells. Over the past
few years Herceptin® (trastuzumab) has become the standard
treatment for this kind of cancer. While it is known
that it blocks the activity of this protein, its exact
mechanism of action has remained a mystery. ≥≥≥
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April 21, 2011
EFFECTIVE PREVENTION STRATEGIES AMONG INJECTION DRUG USERS IN
MONTREAL
The results of an epidemiological study at the CRCHUM
show
that injection drug users (IDUs) recruited after
2001 and who obtained all their
syringes from Montreal’s safe needle distribution network
were five times less
likely
to be infected by HIV than users who obtained their needles
elsewhere.
Led by the CRCHUM’s Dr. Julie Bruneau, who is also a
professor at the Université de
Montréal, the study
confirms the importance of cocaine injection, intensity
of
injection activities, needle sharing and unstable
housing in the HIV epidemic among
IDUs. The study also indicates that sexual transmission in
this
population plays a
role, regardless of injection practices. ≥≥≥
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April 8, 2011
A WORLD FIRST:
THE DISCOVERY OF A COMMON GENETIC CAUSE OF AUTISM AND
EPILEPSY
Researchers from the CHUM Research Centre (CRCHUM) have identified
a new gene that predisposes
people to both autism and epilepsy.
Led by the neurologist Dr. Patrick Cossette, the research team
found a severe mutation of the synapsin
gene (SYN1) in all members of a large French-Canadian family
suffering from epilepsy, including individuals
also suffering from autism. This study also includes an analysis of
two cohorts of individuals from Quebec,
which made it possible to identify other mutations in the SYN1 gene
among 1% and 3.5% of those suffering
respectively from autism and epilepsy,while several carriers of the
SYN1 mutation displayed symptoms
of both disorders ≥≥≥
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January 8, 2011
AMYOTROPHIC LATERAL SCLEROSIS (ALS): NEW GENETIC
INSIGHTS
In order to better understand the causes of amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig's
Disease, a group of scientists at the CRCHUM studied 29 genes
involved in the development of motor neurons
in 190 ALS patients from Quebec and France. The results of this
large-scale study were recently published in the
online version of Archives of Neurology.
“This is the first time a large-scale genetic study is
carried out in the field of ALS. By focusing on this group of
29 genes specifically expressed in motor neurons, we found a high
frequency of rare non-synonymous mutations
in our cohort of ALS patients.” says senior author and
researcher at CRCHUM, ≥≥≥
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