HOW PHILANTHROPY IS AMPLIFYING PRODUCTIVITY

The team has leveraged the power of philanthropy to secure grant money at an average ROI of 5:1 and expand the impact of their work. These grants are crucial to ensure sustainability and growth for a future institute.

We are pleased to share that in 2022, the team secured an astonishing 31 new research grants totaling $15.1M and 20 student support awards totaling $1.1M.

PROSTATE CANCER

Dr. Amina Zoubeidi, Professor and Senior Research Scientist at VPC and Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Cancer Therapy Resistance, has secured a $6 million Terry Fox Program Project grant for the VPC team’s research targeting prostate tumours that evade standard therapy. Her group will investigate how some prostate cancer cells evade current targeted therapies, assess the ability of cells to change their genetic information in response to environmental cues (emergent cell plasticity) and uncover exploitable vulnerabilities. This research will allow scientists to understand why some cancers are able to evade standard treatments and try to find new ways to attack these difficult cancer cells.

PATENTS AND COMMERCIALIZATION

Patents and commercialization play a significant role in advancing the health care industry. They encourage innovation by granting exclusive rights to research centres, allowing them to protect their inventions and recover investments made in research and development. In addition, patents can make health care inventions more attractive to funding organizations, providing the opportunity for research scientists to expand their studies through grants.