Blog Carnival: We’re answering this year’s question with a firm “maybe!”

by Stacey Johnson | Aug 29, 2018

By what measure do we determine whether an industry “has arrived?” Goldman Sachs issued a report in 2017 with a section titled “The Coming Age of Regenerative Medicine” and media were quick to report this. A Business Insider headline stated that “money is pouring in...

Growing pains for the regenerative medicine industry

by Samantha Payne | Aug 29, 2018

This blog is part of the third annual Signals blog carnival, in which multiple bloggers write about one topic that are then posted simultaneously, exposing readers to a variety of perspectives on a single topic in a unique and interesting format. You can read about...

The future of AI in the life sciences

by Carmen Wong | Aug 23, 2018

Artificial intelligence (AI). Machine learning. To most people, these are just buzzwords and synonymous. Whether or not we fully understand what both are, they are slowly integrating into our everyday lives. Virtual assistants such as Siri? AI is at work. The...

Insider tips for becoming a PI

by Samantha Yammine | Aug 15, 2018

You’ve heard the rumours – it is notoriously difficult to get a job as a tenure-track Principal Investigator (PI). The 10,000 PhDs project reported that, on average, about 23 percent of life sciences PhDs from the University of Toronto get a tenure stream position. An...

Right Turn: Come one, come all to Signals’ 2018 blog carnival

by Stacey Johnson | Aug 1, 2018

  Two years ago in August, Signals hosted a blog carnival and it was such a success we’ve been doing it ever since. If you are scratching your head at the term “blog carnival” and wondering if this website has been hacked, I recommend you read the section below....

The Betrayal: turning cancer against itself

by Sara M. Nolte | Jul 30, 2018

I honestly believe that we’re living in the most exciting time for cancer therapeutics. The past few years (dare I say decades, even?) have pushed the boundaries of cancer treatment from radiation and chemotherapy to the use of cancer-targeted antibodies, oncolytic...

Going in for the kill: NK cells enter the immunotherapy arena

by Guest | Jul 23, 2018

Erika Siren lives in Vancouver, British Columbia where she is currently a Ph.D Candidate in the University of British Columbia’s Department of Chemistry. Under the supervision of Dr. Jayachandran Kizhakkedathu, Erika develops biomaterials that can be used to...

The long road to commercialization

by Guest | Jul 16, 2018

Carmen Wong completed her PhD studies on creating viruses for cancer research. Since then, she has been working with inventors from universities, accelerators, and startup companies to commercialize their innovations. Carmen was a commercialization analyst with CCRM...

Single-cell RNA sequencing: An emerging superpower in stem cell research

by Guest | Jul 9, 2018

Lyla El-Fayomi is an MSc student in the Molecular Genetics department at the University of Toronto. Under the supervision of Dr. Derek van der Kooy at the Donnelly Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research, she is currently studying neural stem cells using...

Are blood stem cells hiding inside the bone to avoid sun damage?

by Jovana Drinjakovic | Jul 3, 2018

Blood stem cells may have evolved to inhabit bone tissue to avoid DNA damage from UV rays, a Harvard study suggests. Also known as haematopoietic stem cells (HSCs), these cells are tasked with making blood — a medley of about a dozen cell types that move oxygen around...