MONTREAL, May 7, 2019 – This year, in continuing the tradition of past years, the Cole Foundation has offered seventeen new fellowship grants for a total funding value of $600,000 to be disbursed over the course of the next two years to help finance research into the fight against pediatric and young adult leukemia and lymphoma. In addition, the Foundation has offered three new Transition Grants for a total funding value of $450,000 to be disbursed over the course of the next 3 years to help new principal investigators in pediatric leukemia and lymphoma research get their labs started on their research programs.

At CHU Sainte-Justine

Fellowship grants 

• Abderrahim Benmoussa, Post PhD program under the supervision of Valérie Marcil
  Project: Effet des traitements chimiothérapiques sur le microbiote intestinal et ses métabolites dans les cancers pédiatriques
• Kristopher Lamore, Post PhD program under the supervision of Serge Sultan
  Project: Effets tardifs objectivés, santé subjective et besoins d’aide des plus vulnérables dans une cohorte de survivants d'une leucémie aiguë lymphoblastique pédiatrique
• Mitra Shourian, Post PhD program under the supervision of Hélène Decaluwe
  Project: Reversal of T-cell exhaustion and ex vivo programming of T-cell fates for adoptive immunotherapy of pediatric leukemia
• Kateryna Petrykey, PhD program under the supervision of Maja Krajinovic
  Project: The association study between genetic factors and long-term treatment related complications in survivors of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Transition Grant 

• Étienne Caron
  Project: Identifying therapeutically relevant spliced neoantigen for vaccine development against pediatric acute myeloid leukemia

Since the inception of these grants twelve years ago and including this year, the Cole Foundation will have contributed close to $12 million in financial aid to more than 195 researchers in laboratories and hospitals situated in the Greater Montreal area through collaborations with l’Université de Montréal; McGill University; and INRS - Institut Armand-Frappier Research Centre.

“The Cole Foundation is committed to helping to develop the next generation of researchers, said Barry Cole, President of the foundation. The objective of our efforts to support the medical faculties at the Université de Montréal and McGill University, as well as at the Institut national de recherche scientifique (INRS) - Institut Armand-Frappier is to create a “Centre of Expertise” in Montreal for research into the fight against pediatric and young adult leukemia and lymphoma.”

This year’s announcement was welcomed by Aimee Ryan, - Associate Dean (Biomedical BSc, Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies), McGill Faculty of Medicine, “Cole Foundation continues to be an invaluable collaborator in our drive to better understand paediatric leukemia and care for young patients and their families.” She stressed, “Early career scientists at McGill and other leading institutions across Québec benefit immensely from Cole Foundation’s support for their research, and from the opportunity to network and exchange ideas on the research day.”

“I am very happy to see an additional 11 Cole Foundation recipients, declares Dr. Christian Baron, vice-dean (Research and Development), Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal. The announcement of this philanthropic contribution from the Cole Foundation is great news for the university, for our researchers and their students who are dedicated to the development of improved therapies for pediatric blood cancers.”

In connection with the new round of grants, the Cole Foundation has organized a Research Celebration Day of discussions on the state of research in the field of pediatric cancer. This event was held on May 3 at the Université de Montréal and included a special presentation by Dr. Michelle Le Beau from the Comprehensive Cancer Center of University of Chicago. The title of her talk was: Therapy-Related Myeloid Neoplasms: When Genetics and Environment Collide

All of the members of the Montreal medical research community were be invited.

Cole Foundation Research Fellowships (2019-2021)

Université de Montréal

Abderrahim Benmoussa, Post PhD program
Project title: Effet des traitements chimiothérapiques sur le microbiote intestinal et ses métabolites dans les cancers pédiatriques

Esterina D’Asti, Post PhD program
Project title: Translation initiation factor eIF4E reprograms vesiculation and hyaluronan release

Seerat Elahi, Post PhD program
Project title: Investigating the underlying pathological pathways and mechanism of action of selective small molecule inhibitors in MLL-r AML

Kristopher Lamore, Post PhD program
Project title: Effets tardifs objectivés, santé subjective et besoins d’aide des plus vulnérables dans une cohorte de survivants d'une leucémie aiguë lymphoblastique pédiatrique

Sarah Pasquin, Post PhD program
Project title: Evaluating the impact of immunosuppressive drugs on the therapeutic efficacy of human DN T Cells

Mitra Shourian, Post PhD program
Project title: Reversal of T-cell exhaustion and ex vivo programming of T-cell fates for adoptive immunotherapy of pediatric leukemia

Zhenghai Tang, Post PhD program
Project title: Targeting the SIRP-CD47 immune checkpoint against non-Hodgkin's lymphoma

Oumaima Ahmed, PhD program
Project title: ASXL family of transcription co-factors in childhood leukemia

Anca Apavaloaei, PhD program
Project title: Identification of antigens shared between tumors and induced pluripotent stem cells

Ema Elissen Flores Diaz, PhD program
Project title: A Synthetic Lethal Strategy Targeting the Vulnerabilities of pre-Leukemic Stem Cells

Kateryna Petrykey, PhD program
Project title: The association study between genetic factors and long-term treatment related complications in survivors of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

McGill University

Luis Alberto Perez-Quintero, Post PhD program
Project title: Improving the fitness of CD8 lymphocytes for cellular based cancer immunotherapy

Steven Findlay, PhD program
Project title: Implication of a novel DNA repair factor, SHLD1, in B cell development and lymphoma pathobiology

Marion Lacroix, PhD program
Project title: Role of the RNA helicase DDX3X in Burkitt Lymphoma

Felix Lombard, PhD program
Project title: A preclinical study of Double Negative T cells to treat chronic Graft-versus-Host Disease

Amélia Martinez-Villarreal, PhD program
Project title: Investigation of predisposing genetic factors, prognostic and diagnostic markers for Hypopigmented variant of Cutaneous T-Cell Lymphoma in Hispanic individuals

Ryan Rys, PhD program
Project title: I Optimizing Immunotherapy in High-Risk Lymphoma

Cole Foundation New Investigator Program

Casimiro Geraduzzi, Hôpital Maisonneuve-Rosemont
Project: Mechanistic Analysis of FLT4 on p53 in Childhood Leukemia

Marie-Claude Bourgeois-Daigneault, Centre de recherche, Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal
Project: Using oncolytic viruses for personalized anti-leukemia vaccination

Étienne Caron, CHU Sainte-Justine Research Center
Project: Identifying therapeutically relevant spliced neoantigen for vaccine development against pediatric acute myeloid leukemia

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