July 2016

WCRG Matters
A newsletter to keep members and partners informed.
New WCRG Website Launched


We are very excited to announce the launch of our newly designed website! It is now easier to navigate and more user friendly. The site provides information about WCRG, tools for researchers and resources for the community.

Be sure to visit us at: www.windsorcancerresearch.com.
 
WCRG Researcher Snapd Shot

WCRG has recently partnered with snapd Windsor to highlight our WCRG cancer researchers. Interviews will be found in the print edition of snapd Windsor and shared through various newsletters and announcements. The goal of these "Snapd Shots" is to raise awareness about the cancer research conducted in Windsor-Essex and stimulate new research collaborations. To see the June edition click here.
2nd Cancer Research Think Tank
On July 15th, WCRG hosted its 2nd Cancer Research Think Tank. Over 30 participants representing a variety of disciplines and institutions took part in making this event a huge success! The objective of the WCRG Think Tank series is to bring people together and share research ideas in an effort to build collaborative projects and increase the number of cancer research grant submissions. Don't miss the next one! 

WHEN: Friday October 14, 2016 from 1:30-3:30pm 
WHERE: University of Windsor, Joyce Entrepreneurship Centre  

RSVP to Karen Metcalfe at karenmet@uwindsor.ca
Member Accomplishments
In 2016, we are focused on learning more about all WCRG members, and to recognize and share their accomplishments with each other and the community.

Publications
 
Freeman-Gibb, Laurie, A., Janz, Nancy, J., Katapodi, Maria, C., Zikmund-Fisher, Brian, J., Northouse, Laurel,L, The relationship between illness representations, risk perception and fear of cancer recurrence in breast cancer survivors, Psyco-Oncology, 2016.


Conferences 
   
Abed Alkhateeb (Session Chair), Iman Rezaeian and Luis Rueda (Advisory Committee) organized and presented a session at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS) International Student Conference (ISC) (Ottawa, Ontario) entitled "Special Presentations: Transcriptome analysis in cancer diagnosis and treatment."

Dora Cavallo-Medved, Youshaa El-Abed, Melanie Grondin and Ahmed Salim co-presented a session at the 10th Annual International Teaching and Learning Conference (Oakland, MI) entitled "Transformative Learning through Student-Faculty Partnerships in Curriculum Development and Community Engagement."
 
Dora Cavallo-Medved, Mitchell Elliott and Melanie Grondin co-presented a session at the 2016 Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (London, ON) entitled "
Building Student-Faculty Partnerships in Curriculum Development and Community Engagement." Melanie and Mitchell both were awarded STLHE conference student bursaries.

Bashier Elkarami, Abedalrhman Alkhateeb and Luis Rueda co-presented at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS) International Student Conference (ISC) (Ottawa, Ontario). Their presentation was entitled "Cost-Sensitive Classification on Class-balanced Ensembles for Imbalanced Non-coding RNA Data."

Melanie Grondin and Mitchell Elliott co-presented an interactive workshop at the national Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education Conference (London, ON) entitled "Building Student-Faculty Partnerships in Curriculum Development and Community Engagement. Both Melanie and Mitchell were awarded student bursaries from the conference.

Mojtaba Kordestani, Abedalrhman Alkhateeb, Iman Rezaeian, Luis Rueda and Mehrdad Saif co-presented at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS) International Student Conference (ISC) (Ottawa, Ontario). Their presentation was entitled "A new clustering method using wavelet-based probability density functions (PDF) for identifying patterns in time series."   


Members in the Community

Ingrid Qemo, Bre-Anne Fifiled, Melanie Grondin, John Talia and Lisa Porter, participated in the Canadian Cancer Society's Relay for Life.

Ingrid Qemo, Samer Jassar, Mat Stover and Karen Metcalfe participated in the Brain Tumour Walk Windsor. They provided research information to walk participants, were part of the event organizing committee and lead a team that raised over $20,000!

In collaboration with Windsor Regional Hospital Child Life Specialists, Dr. Mohammad Jarrar and Dr. Lisa Porter presented at a Parent Information Night. WCRG volunteers Youshaa El-Abed and Melanie Grondin provided educational cancer research activities for the children as their parents listened to the presentation and participated in a Q&A. 

Be sure to submit any news items as they happen and we will include them. Pictures and links to details are welcome!
 
Remember, we can't share it if we don't know it!
 
Thank you to Our WCRG Student Volunteers

The WCRG student volunteers are a key ingredient to our success. Often behind the scenes, this dedicated group of students never hesitate to support our events and projects. We'd like to thank them for all they do, share some of their recent successes and highlight four students who will be moving on. We will definitely miss them!


Awards

Amy Basilious was awarded an NSERC USRA to work in the Porter Lab.
 
Melanie Grondin was featured in the spring edition of UWindsor Alumni Magazine and also was awarded her 3rd NSERC USRA to work in the Porter lab.
 
Samer Jassar presented a session at Ontario Biology Day (Ryerson University, Toronto, ON), and at the UWill Discover Conference (University of Windsor), where he was awarded the 1st place prize. Samer also earned the 2nd place research award at the UWindsor Biology Undergraduate Thesis Colloquium.
 
Marisa Market was awarded the Outstanding Undergraduate Student award at the UWindsor Awards for Excellence in Research, Scholarship and Creative Activity.
 
 
Moving on...
 
Hussein Hammoud graduated with B.Sc. in Honours Biological Sciences with great distinction, and has been accepted into the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry at the University of Western Ontario.

Samer Jassar wi ll be graduating this fall with B.Sc. in Biological with Sciences with Thesis and a minor in Psychology, and has been accepted into the University of Detroit Mercy, School of Dentistry. 
 
Shelby Koschuck graduated this spring with a B.Sc. in Biochemistry
and has been accepted into the University of Detroit Mercy, School of Dentistry.

Ahmed Salim graduated this spring with B.Sc. in Honours Biological Sciences with great distinction, and has been accepted to the Doctor of Medicine Program in Florida.
 

Congratulations and best wishes in the future!
Conference Registration is Now Open
WCRG will be hosting our 3rd Biennial International Cancer Research Conference at Caesars Windsor on Saturday November 19th, 2016.

Early bird registration is now open
  • General registration - $200 ($250 after October 15th)
  • Student registration - $50 ($90 after October 15th)

We look forward to welcoming our two keynote speakers:
Dr. Shoukat Dedhar, PhD
University of British Columbia
British Columbia Cancer Agency
 
Dr. Elizabeth Eisenhauer, MD FRCPC
Queen's University
Kingston General Hospital
Funding Opportunities

 

Go to our website to see a complete list of funding opportunities for cancer researchers. We invite you to use the resource as a tool to plan your grant submissions over the next year. Please contact us if we can help facilitate collaborations or provide feedback to strengthen submissions.   

 

Be sure to 'like' us.
www.windsorcancerresearch.ca
wcrg@uwindsor.ca