A (Heart) Beat Above The Competition

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A (Heart) Beat Above The Competition

image of Yun Xiao & Paul Santerre - 9th World Biomaterials Congress,Chendu China

Professor Paul Santerre and Yun Xiao in Chengdu, China for 9th World Biomaterials Congress

IBBME graduate students make the grade in two separate national and international competitions

27 June, 2012

Several of IBBME's graduate students had a lot to celebrate this month. Mark Blaser, Lewis Reis and Stephen Czarnuch attended the CIHR Canadian Student Health Research Forum (CSHRF), a conference which only the top 5% of doctoral students in Canada are invited to attend.

The June 12 ^th-14 ^thconference, which focused on "health research," was attended by several hundred of the brightest and best doctoral scholars from across Canada. IBBME's three nominations were all invited to attend the conference, and Blaser and Reis walked away from the poster competition with "Honourable Mentions."

"The caliber of students and their research presented at this conference was astounding, so to even be considered as a nominee to attend this conference was a huge accomplishment for me and helps put into perspective the research I am doing and the quality of it," says Reis, a third-year Biomedical Engineering PhD student. "To then get an honourable mention for my poster was completely unexpected, but again very rewarding."

Reis, who works under Associate Professor Milica Radisic, is researching the incorporation of "growth factor" molecules—molecules that help direct repair—into a gel that can be delivered to the heart after an injury such as a heart attack. The hope is to save the injured muscle or repair the damaged tissue.

Blaser, a third-year PhD student in Associate Professor Craig Simmons' lab, also concentrates his research on the heart. "My work focuses on aortic valve disease," says Blaser, who hopes to discover earlier diagnoses and hopefully the production of "possible targets for pharmacological intervention, so that surgical replacement can be avoided in the future."

"There is no medical treatment for valve disease," says Simmons, "in part because we understand so little about the early stages of the disease when therapeutic intervention is most likely to be effective. Mark's work provides new insights into initial disease processes at play in the valve. Ultimately his work may lead to the identification of therapies or biomarkers that will allow the disease to be arrested early on before the "point of no return" when the valves are calcified and fibrotic." Simmons, who argues that Blaser created his research models "largely on his own," points out that the young PhD student's work is being recognized widely: Blaser was recently awarded 2nd place in the "Young Investigator" competition at the 2012 Heart Valve Biology and Tissue Engineering Conference in Greece, and 3rd place in the poster competition at the 2012 Canadian Connective Tissue Conference in Toronto.

Professor Christopher Yip, IBBME's Graduate program coordinator, thinks the competition results speak for themselves. "It was great to hear that Mark, Lewis and Stephen were chosen to attend the meeting, and that Mark and Lewis won awards at the poster competition. This [conference] really showcases the excellence of our trainees and the world-class research underway at IBBME."

A world away, Yun Xiao, a second-year student of Professor Radisic's who fast-tracked into the collaborative PhD program between the Department of Chemical Engineering & Applied Science and IBBME, presented her research in tissue engineering (mainly cardiac tissue engineering) and wound healing at the 9 ^thWorld Biomaterials Congress held in Chengdu, China from June 1 ^st-5th.

Xiao was one of a handful of IBBME graduate students who attended the massive conference. "There were 1735 posters presented at the conference," says Xiao, "and there were twelve sessions going on at the same time." According to Professor Paul Santerre, IBBME's Director who also attended the conference, "there were about 3300 attendees" at the conference.

The number of participants makes Xiao's results all the more astounding: she walked away from the mammoth poster competition, which included posters by students, professors, research departments as well as companies, with a "Best Poster" prize for her work entitled "Developing Cardiac Biofibers with Microfabricated Devices."

The World Biomaterials Congress was just Xiao's first academic conference experience, but she wasn't at all phased by the competition. "I was more concerned about finishing everything in five minutes than being nervous," she explains "Finishing the whole story in such a short time and making an impression was much more difficult than I thought."

Though new to the large academic conference, Xiao was no stranger to the host university. "I also did my undergrad degree at Sichuan University," says Xiao, "so I also volunteered to help them on some organizing."

The 10 ^thWorld Biomedical Congress (http://wbc2016.org/) will be held in Montreal from May 18-22 in 2016, and is being co-organized by Professor Santerre along with other colleagues from the Canadian Biomaterials Society .

image of Lewis Reis at CSHRF Conference June 2012

Lewis Reis at CSHRF courtesty Jennifer Ezirim

Image of Mark Blaser at CSHRF Conference June 2012

Mark Blaser at CSHRF courtesy Jennifer Ezirim

Read more about the research being conducted in Associate Professor Milica Radisic's and Associate Professor Craig Simmons' labs.

Read more about IBBME's Biomedical Engineering graduate programs.

University of Toronto Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering

A (Heart) Beat Above The Competition

IBBME graduate students make the grade in two separate national and international competitions