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THE ART OF THE CURE

SCIENCE PROFESSOR’S COLLABORATION WITH DIGITAL MEDIA RESEARCHER PRODUCES A BIG-PICTURE LOOK AT CANCER RESEARCH

By CONNIE JESKE CRANE

There’s no getting around it, the statistics are chilling. According to Canadian Cancer Society figures, in 2017, an estimated 5,500 Canadians were diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Of those, 4,800 ultimately died from the disease.

From her state-of-the-art lab in downtown Toronto’s MaRS Discovery District, Sarah Sabatinos, a professor in Ryerson University’s Department of Chemistry and Biology, is seeking to improve those terrible odds. Sabatinos and her team of molecular science students are analyzing DNA replication models, seeking to understand where chemotherapy treatment could be improved—particularly for high-mortality types like pancreatic cancer.

With pancreatic cancer, chemotherapy treatment is tripped up by cancer cells’ adaptability, says Sabatinos. Her team’s recent project focuses on gemcitabine, a drug Sabatinos says is critically important for pancreatic cancers, as well as several other cancers.

“It’s one of the few options, but the problem is, initially a lot of the pancreatic cancers respond to gemcitabine, but then later they become resistant.”

The research aim, she says, is to discover what contributes to the development of such drug resistance and learn how to prevent it.

“We’re trying to figure out the molecular complexes and the changes that happen within an individual cell and across a population, and then see if we can detect patterns.”

This research, which used yeast to examine how specific cancer mutations respond to gemcitabine, was recently published in a paper called, “A Chromatin Fiber Analysis Pipeline to Model DNA Synthesis and Structures in Fission Yeast.”

To hasten the progress, Sabatinos has fostered a unique collaboration—with Ali Mazalek, who holds a Canada Research Chair in Digital Media and Innovation, and is a professor in the RTA School of Media in the Faculty of Communication and Design.

In Mazalek’s lab, the rich datasets generated by the Sabatinos team’s algorithms are displayed across large wall and tabletop screens using Tangible Chromatin, a visual analytics software suite. The technology provides dynamically multi-faceted views of replicated and unreplicated areas of chromatin fibers with protein distributions, which makes it easier for the researchers to look for patterns.

The next step in this joint project will be to analyze responses in human cancer cells. Sabatinos’s team will publish another paper soon, also related to cancer cell mutation.

This work couldn’t happen without the dedication of graduate and undergraduate students in the Sabatinos lab. Zohreh Kianfard is a doctoral candidate in molecular science who has spent the past four years developing a yeast-based test of gemcitabine sensitivity and resistance.

Her work is showing how specific mutations found in cancer can cause drug resistance. As undergraduate thesis students, Kyle Cheung, Biomedical Science ’18; Saba Zafar, Biomedical Science ’18; and Gianluca Calcagno, Biomedical Science ’19, worked with Kianfard and made essential contributions to the project. Cheung and Zafar are now master of science students in the Sabatinos lab.

A second undergraduate success story is that of Kazeera Aliar, Biomedical Science ’18. After declaring an interest in computational biology, Aliar, Sabatinos and Mazalek worked together to create the new interactive data program called “Tangible Chromatin.” Aliar successfully finished her undergraduate thesis on this project in the Sabatinos lab, and is now working in a cancer research lab at Princess Margaret Hospital.

Beyond improving drug treatment, new discoveries about what causes mutant cells to replicate—or not—will potentially affect disease prevention as well. As Sabatinos explains what's ahead for her research, “If a cell or person has that mutation, what does that mean? What can we do to prevent a problem like cancer from developing?”

Summer 2019 / Ryerson University Magazine 27