Herbal medicines are mainly used to maintain health, prevent diseases and treat chronic conditions. Although many Canadians have taken or are regularly take herbal products, there still are concerns about the safety and quality of these products. Osteoporosis is a chronic disease called silent thief since there are no symptoms until bone fractures happened. The […]

To design effective and patient-specific cancer therapy, sensitive detection of relapse and distant metastases by non-invasive medical imaging is essential, for which MRI offers tremendous potential due to wide availability of the equipment in clinic and avoidance of ionizing radiation. Although gadolinium-based contrast agents are the most frequently used for MRI, they are associated with […]

Cannabis has been in use for a long period of time both as medicine and as well as a recreational drug. With the current legalization of the crop in Canada, cannabis industry is expanding but there is limited information on improving the medical cannabis in terms of the content of minor cannabinoids such as THCV […]

As an analytical platform, the Sanofi Pasteur Analytical Sciences (Toronto) Molecular Biology Centre (MBC) is applying and optimizing the use of high-throughput sequencing (HTS). The detection of adventitious viruses in biological products relies on a set of methods defined by the regulatory agencies called the compendial methods. High-throughput sequencing has the potential to improve the […]

Influenza causes seasonal illness characterized by fever, myalgia and respiratory symptoms which can lead to hospitalization and death. Although it is a vaccine preventable disease, influenza contributes directly and indirectly to a large number of hospitalizations and outpatient visits. More specifically, influenza causes every year approximately 12,000 hospitalizations and 3,500 deaths in Canada, of which […]

DoseBiome has developed a new probiotic that targets several aspects of oral health: dental caries, periodontal diseases, and halitosis. This project aims to understand the exact mechanism of our probiotic’s inhibitory properties against the pathogens associated with the above diseases. DoseBiome is a new start-up in the probiotic/microbiome health sector, and this project will allow […]

Most of the medicines available today are either purified from plants or derived from compounds produced by plants. The Cannabis (marijuana) plant in particular produces an enormous variety of molecules that have valuable pharmaceutical potential – in addition to tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is the primary psychoactive molecule in the pant, the cannabis plant produces dozens […]

Sanofi-Pasteur is developing new vaccine formulations that need to be evaluated on their efficacy and potency. Traditionally, the use of animal models to predict human immunity has been accepted as the best way to select vaccine formulations. However, animal models can be costly and time-prohibitive, and the assays employed to assess vaccine efficacy and potency […]

Glaucoma is the second leading cause of blindness in the world, mainly induced by increased pressure in the eye. Marijuana has been shown to reduce such pressure, thus benefit glaucoma patients. In the previous project, we screened several individual components from marijuana extracts and tested their ability on keeping cells alive. The current project puts […]

Opioid-related harms such as abuse, misuse, addiction, diversion and overdose have been rising exponentially, a phenomenon referred to as the opioid epidemic. The current research will examine federal and provincial risk minimization measures (RMMs) regarding the opioid epidemic starting in 2016. We will develop a landscape of federal and provincial opioid RMMs, describe trends over […]

Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women worldwide. Estrogen, a sex hormone in women plays a key role in the proliferation of cancer cells especially in post-menopausal women. Selective estrogen receptor modulators (SERMs) like tamoxifen and raloxifene are the most efficient drugs for treatment of breast cancer. These drugs bind to estrogen receptors […]

IMV Inc. is developing injectable cancer immune therapy using the company’s DPXTM technology. DPX is a patented formulation that displays excellent tumor control and provides a long lasting and specific effect. The way by which this therapy exerts its effect is unclear but the translational team at IMV is determined to discover its mechanism of […]