News

2014 MDRC annual retreat

MDRC annual retreat is scheduled for February 7, 2014. It will be held in the auditorium of the new CHUM research center, 900 St-Denis Street. Dr Stephen C. Woods from the University of Cincinnati is the invited speaker for the "2014 J Denis McGarry Lecture".

We also have the pleasure to announce that the MDRC retreat will now feature two prestigious lectures, one in basic research, the J Denis McGarry Lecture and one in clinical research, named in the memory of George Cahill. Dr Bernard Zinman from the University of Toronto will be the first invited speaker for the George Cahill Lecture.

More details will be available in due time.

AmorChem venture capital fund invests at MDRC

Two projects of the MDRC researchers Marc Prentki and Nabil Seidah have recently been funded by the venture capital fund AmorChem: more than 1 million and 1.5 million $, respectively. The shareholders of this fund are the Quebec government, Fonds de solidarité FTQ and Merck. The mission of AmorChem is to increase the commercial value of academic research discoveries in Quebec. Click here for an article in La Presse about this news (in French).

Job Opportunities:

• Laboratory research technician position at Bêtagenex, Laval. For more information please click here.
• Doctoral student. Dr André Marette Laboratory, Laval University, Quebec City. For more information please click here.

Invitation to the 1^st Annual Canadian NeuroMetabolic Club meeting

Stephanie Fulton, Thierry Alquier, Maia Kokoeva and Tony Lam are organizing the 1^st Annual Canadian NeuroMetabolic Club meeting to take place in Toronto on May 20-21, 2013. For more information please contact info.neuroclub@gmail.com.

Three MDRC students are awarded at the 5^th COLosSUS annual meeting

Three MDRC students were awarded for best presentation at the 5^th COLosSUS annual meeting, held last February 14 and 15 at Orford. These are Meriem Semache and Bader Zarrouki, from Vincent Poitout laboratory, and Stéphanie Auguste, from Stephanie Fulton laboratory. Congratulations!

A $100,000 donation from Sun Life Financial

Sun Life Financial is providing a $100,000 donation to CRCHUM-affiliated MDRC researchers to fund two pilot projects linked to the prevention of diabetes. The two research teams selected will each receive an amount of $50,000 to undertake new fundamental research projects. Click here to read the Sun Life Financial communiqué.

Photographer : Marcel La Haye©

From left to right: Mr. Hugo Rivard-Royer, Assistant Chief Executive Officer, Fondation du CHUM, Dr Jacques Turgeon, CRCHUM Director, Dr Vincent Poitout, MDRC Co-Director and CRCHUM Scientific Director, Mrs. Diane Lafontaine, Assistant Vice President, Marketing and Communications, Sun Life Financial, Quebec, Dr Marc Prentki, MDRC Director, and Mr. Serge Langlois, President and Executive Director, Diabète Québec.

MDRC success for a CFI competition - Creation of the BIOcMET consortium

The Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) announced last January 15 the attribution of a 6.5 million $ grant to fund the project entitled "The Montreal Cardiometabolic biomarker and drug discovery consortium (BIOcMET)". This project is led by Dr Marc Prentki, MDRC director. Among the 10 investigators involved in the project, 8 are MDRC members: Drs Prentki, Poitout, Hamet, Turgeon, Gaudreau (UdM/CRCHUM), Rabasa-Lhoret, Seidah (UdM/IRCM) and Sladek (McGill). The two other researchers are Drs Blanchette (McGill) and Coulombe (UdM/IRCM).

MDRC/Diabète Québec Pilot & Feasibility Grants – 2012-2013 competition results

Thanks to a generous grant from Diabète Québec, the MDRC is pleased to provide "Pilot & Feasibility" grants of $10,000 per year. These grants are intended to help junior investigators in producing preliminary data that forms the basis for a subsequent full grant application to a major funding agency.

Here are the 2012-2013 recipients:

• Jennifer Estall, IRCM, for the project entitled "A novel mouse model of ß-cell insufficiency in type 2 diabetes".
• Stephanie Fulton, CRCHUM, for the project entitled "Cell-specific knockout of ABHD6: Role in 2-AG endocannabinoid accumulation and appetite control".
• Julie Lavoie, CRCHUM, for a project on the antidiabetic effects of a renin/prorenin receptor blocker.

Faculté de Médecine de l'Université de Montréal/MDRC Studentships

In recognition of the MDRC success at the Canada Foundation for Innovation competition, the Faculté de Médecine de l'Université de Montréal generously gives us $40,000 in funding for Msc and PhD students. Thanks to this support, 4 studentships of $10,000 are awarded each year.

Here are the 2012-2013 recipients:

• Shangang Zhao, PhD student, Marc Prentki lab (CRCHUM). Project title: "a/ß-domain containing hydrolase-6 (ABHD6) comme cible pour l’obésité et le diabète de type 2".
• Véronique Gingras, PhD student, Rémi Rabasa-Lhoret lab (IRCM). Project title: "Le syndrome métabolique chez des adultes atteints de diabète de type 1 (double diabète): Étude des facteurs de risque et de l'impact de l'amélioration des habitudes de vie".
• Simon Bissonnette, PhD student, May Faraj lab (IRCM). Project title: "Effet des apoB-lipoprotéines et des acides gras oméga-3 sur l'inflammasome NLRP3, la fonction du tissu adipeux et la clairance des gras diététiques chez des sujets obèses".
• Shiao-Ying Chang, PhD student, Shaoling Zhang lab (CRCHUM). Project title: "Maternal diabetes and perinatal programming of hypertension: roles of angiotensin converting enzyme-2 (ACE2)".

2013 MDRC annual retreat

The seventh MDRC Annual Retreat, held on January 18, has been a success, thanks to the organizers and the 166 participants. Forty-eight posters and a dozen of talk were presented including the outstanding "AstraZeneca-BMS J Denis McGarry Lecture" given by Dr Steven Kahn. Among the presenters, nine students or post-doctoral fellows were awarded in their category for best presentation:

• Simon Bissonnette, May Faraj laboratory
• Khalil Bouyakdan, Thierry Alquier laboratory
• Hasna Maachi, John Chan laboratory
• Daniel Oropeza, Jennifer Estall laboratory
• Estelle Simo, Ashok Srivastava laboratory
• Bouchra Taib, Thierry Alquier laboratory
• Benjamin Wiles, Simon Wing laboratory
• Bader Zarrouki, Vincent Poitout laboratory
• Shangang Zhao, Marc Prentki laboratory

We thank all the sponsors of the 2013 Annual Retreat: AstraZeneca-BMS, Eli Lilly Canada, Merck, Medtronic, Servier, Pfizer, Diabète Québec, Institut de Recherches Cliniques de Montréal, Centre de Recherche du CHUM, Réseau de Recherche en Santé Cardiométabolique Diabète et Obésité (CMDO) and CIHR.

2012 MDRC Travel awards

This year again the MDRC is proud to offer student travel awards of $700 for MSc, PhD students as well as post-doc. The awards have to be used to cover registration fees and travel expenses for MDRC students that will give an oral or poster presentation in a scientific meeting.

Two series of awards are planned; the first one will be for a meeting held in spring and summer, and the second will be for fall and winter meetings.

Here are the results of the spring series of the 2012 MDRC Travel awards:

• Daniel-Constantin Manolescu, J.-L. Chiasson lab
• Sophie Ziai, R. Rabasa-Lhoret lab
• Shangang Zhao, M. Prentki lab
• Bader Zarrouki, V. Poitout lab
• Ahmad Haidar, R. Rabasa-Lhoret lab

Congratulations!

Competition for the second series will be announced soon.

2011 Faculté de Médecine de l'Université de Montréal/MDRC Studentship

MDRC is proud to offer new studentships for MSc or PhD students. In recognition of our recent success at the last Canada Foundation for Innovation competition, the Faculté de Médecine de l'Université de Montréal generously give us $40,000 in funding for Msc and PhD students. Thanks to this support, 4 studentships of $10,000 has been awarded this year.

Here are the 4 recipients of the 2011 Faculté de Médecine de l'Université de Montréal/MDRC Studentships:

• Yves Mugabo, PhD student, M. Prentki lab
• Sophie Ziai, PhD student, R. Rabasa-Lhoret lab
• Cécile Hryhorczuk, PhD student, S. Fulton and T. Alquier labs
• Daniel-Constantin Manolescu, PhD student, P. Bhat and J.-L. Chiasson labs

Congratulations!

Marc Prentki is the EASD's 2011 Albert Renold Prize recipient

MDRC Director Marc Prentki has been awarded the 2011 Albert Renold Prize by the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) for "outstanding achievements in research on the islets of Langerhans".

As part of the prize Dr Prentki was invited to give the Albert Renold Lecture at the 2011 EASD annual meeting. The title of his talk was: "Tricycling along the β-cell and its coupling mechanisms for fuel induced insulin secretion".

An exceptional year of CDA funding for MDRC members

Out of the 24 projects funded by the Canadian Diabetes Association (CDA) across Canada this year, 8 were granted to MDRC members!

Pedro Geraldes receives the Scholar Award of the CDA

Pedro Geraldes received the prestigious "Scholar Award" awarded by the CDA to newly independent investigators establishing diabetes-related research in a Canadian university.

MDRC at the forefront

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