The Ontario Cell Biology Symposium will bring together researchers from around the province with the aim of creating new research opportunities and fostering new collaborations. This Symposium aims to provide a forum for students and postdoctoral fellows to present their research. This meeting will cover important topics in cell biology, including signal transduction, metabolism, organelles, cellular architecture, cellular trafficking and advanced microscopy, with a portion of the meeting dedicated to translational studies and emerging methodologies. We aim to create an inclusive environment for this meeting, and one that will feature diverse participants.
In 2021, the Ontario Cell Biology Symposium will have an online format. The meeting (all online) will be held from Monday, July 12 to Friday, July 16th, with talks available through an online platform on each of the 5 days from 11:30am to 1:30pm.
All attendees must register before the conference. Abstract submission is now closed.
PROGRAM
Monday, July 12th
11:30 Opening and welcome
11:40-12:25 Keynote Lecture
Erika Holzbaur, University of Pennsylvania
Actin dynamics regulate spatial mixing of mitochondria in dividing cells
12:30-1:30 DNA, chromatin and gene expression
12:30 Aidan Brown, Ryerson University
Quantitative modeling of protein-translational control of switch-like mRNA localization to mitochondria
12:50 Daniel Espiritu, Queen’s University
Elucidating the Impact of Histone Mutations in Cancer
1:10 Haley Wyatt, University of Toronto
How to make and break the SMX tri-nuclease
Tuesday, July 13th
11:30 Opening and welcome
11:35-12:55 Membrane Traffic and Organelles
11:35 Run Xuan Zeng, Queen’s University
Mitochondrial hyperfusion via metabolic sensing of regulatory amino acids
11:55 Rachel Shannon, University of Toronto
Investigating the role of septins in mitochondrial fission
12:15 Michael Mercer, Ryerson University
Defining the Relationship of mTORC1, PIKfyve and the MiT Family of Transcription Factors
12:35 Claire Martin, Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute
Coupling of miniTurbo-BioID and CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing unmasks the proximity interactome of the Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor during its signaling, endocytosis and trafficking
1:00-1:40 Lightning talks (~6 talks per session x 4 concurrent sessions)
Session 1: Organelles and Membrane Traffic (Chair: Peter Kim)
Sumaiya Soha Application of Metal-Enhanced Fluorescence for Imaging of Biological Systems
Daniel Nino Molecular counting and cluster analysis in single- molecule localization microscopy towards applications in cell biology
Arshia Leekha Regulation of Dynactin by Palmitoylation during Fast Axonal Transport (FAT)
Maria Cecilia Gimenez Analyzing the role of host cell phosphoinositides in the replication cycle of Birnaviruses
Session 2: Signal Transduction 1 (Chair: Michael Scheid)
Shimon Rosenthal Efficient proximity-dependent biotinylation in early zebrafish embryos to interrogate the role of CCM3
Ergi Duli VEGF Ameliorates Thrombotic Phenotype in DGKE Atypical Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome
Jennifer Holborn Inhibiting TrkB signaling with cannflavins limits glioblastoma survival and invasion
Rosa Eskandari Localization and function of TOR Pathway components and their effects on circadian Rhythmicity in the fungus Neurospora
Mikayla Erdelsky The primary cilium: A hyper-localized compartment for cAMP signalling
Session 3: DNA repair, chromatin and cell cycle (Chair: Lisa Porter)
Ceryl Tan Cell size homeostasis in animal cells is maintained at a CDK4-determined target size
Samantha Sanayhie Histone Chaperones influence genome stability and response to DNA stress
Camila Aprosoff Analyzing the SLX4-ATRX-DAXX complex and its roles in genome stability
Bradley D'souza Characterization of Mrc1 during Replication Initiation in Saccharomyces cerevisiae
Ruihuan Yu Investigate the regulatory roles of H2S in lipid overload- induced lipotoxicity and cardiac cell senescence
Session 4: Metabolism 1 (Chair: Nica Borradaile)
Rachel Wilson Inhibition of elongation factor 1A1 activity alters lipid metabolism in the setting of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease
Laura Orofiamma Metabolic control of clathrin-mediated endocytosis by AMPK impacts integrin traffic and cell migration
Kelly Boddington Biosynthesis of novel anti-inflammatory compounds
Fatima Lukmani Developing A Drug-Protein Interactome for Identifying Potential Drug Targets In-situ
Alena Ivanova AMPK activation under metabolic stress spatially redistributes EEA1-positive early endosomes to match metabolic requirements of cancer cells
Rachel Wilson Inhibition of elongation factor 1A1 activity alters lipid metabolism in the setting of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease
Wednesday July 14th
11:35 Opening and welcome
11:35-12:55 Cell Biology: from cells to tissues
11:35 Gonca Erdemci-Tandogan, University of Toronto
Physical mechanisms of tissue compartmentalization in the Drosophila embryo
11:55 Charmi Shah, Queen’s University
Regulation of Podosome Rosette Formation for Focal Control of Sprouting Angiogenesis
12:15 Isabelle Hinch, University of Windsor
The Role of Spy1 in Mammary Involution and Oncogenesis
12:35 Athanasios Litsios, University of Toronto
The spatiotemporal proteome of the yeast cell division cycle
1:00-1:40 Lightning talks (~6 talks per session x 4 concurrent sessions)
Session 5: Development (Chair: Jonathan Lee)
Reuben Samson Deciphering protein changes in subcellular organization associated with somatic cell reprogramming
Jennifer Kaminker LGALS16 is a new biomarker of placental cell differentiation
Jolaine Smith The role of galectins in neutrophilic differentiation of HL-60 cells.
Navroop Dhaliwal A novel in vitro platform for rapid generation of CRISPR Knockout in pluripotent stem cell derived human neurons.
Samantha Tome Is there clinical value in model organisms: a Model Organisms Use (MOUse) database tests clinical referencing habits
Afrin Bhattacharya Investigating the role of microglia in regulating human fetal cortical development using a stem cell-derived co-culture system
Session 6: Metabolism 2 (Chair: Robin Duncan)
John Chan Oleoylethanolamide regulates mitochondrial dynamics of lymphoblasts deficient in Tafazzin
Alexandria Kellington Investigating the effects of oxidized guanines in human physioxic molecular biology
Louis Lo Targeted metabolic modulation of Cancer Cells using Ultrasound-and-Microbubbles
Laura DiGiovanni Peroxisomes maintain mitochondrial redox homeostasis via peroxisome-mitochondria contact
Sadia Rahmani AP2-Associated Kinase is regulated by N- acetylglucosamine modification
Chelsea Margerum Dissecting the Roles of Mitochondrial Fusion in Maintaining Cancer Cell Metabolic Homeostasis
Session 7: Cancer cell biology (Chair: Shaiya Robinson)
Nick Philbin Optimizing the Effectiveness of Aldehyde Dehydrogenase One (ALDH1) as a Breast Cancer Stem Cell (BCSC) marker and Its Clinical Implications in TN Breast Cancer Patients
Sami Alrashed Validation of a Novel Nanoparticle System for Select Targeting of Therapy-Resistant Cell Populations Glioblastoma
Erin Sellars A cell-based reporter to screen for modifiers of BRCA1 protein expression
Parasvi Patel Excessive transcription-replication conflicts are a vulnerability of BRCA1-mutant cancers
Adam Renaud Spy1 Levels Predict Sensitivity of Relapsed Multiple Myeloma to Therapy
Jonathan Tak-Sum Chow Using CRISPR-Cas9 screens to identify microRNA involved in aggressive prostate cancer phenotypes.
Session 8: Cytoskeleton (Chair: Andrew Wilde)
Riya Shah Independent spatially restricted β- and γ-actin networks are required for cytokinesis
Alicyia Walczyk Mooradally Phosphorylation-dependent control of Activity-regulated cytoskeleton-associated protein (Arc) protein by Tnik
Joy Du Dia1-mediated mechanical protection of the actin cytoskeleton is required for myofibroblast differentiation
Thomas Panagiotou Establishment and Maturation of the Intercellular Bridge are Active Processes Required for Cell Division
Anna Christina Erpf A photo-conversion-based visual screening platform to facilitate the identification of centrosomal proteins involved in aberrant cell division and disease
Aminmohamed Manji Pulmonary microvascular endothelial cell barrier dysfunction during sepsis
Thursday, July 15th
11:30 Opening and welcome
11:35-12:55 Cell Biology of disease
11:35 Firyal Ramzan, University of Waterloo
A surprising role for a small protein with a big impact in Multi-System Proteinopathy
11:55 Katrina Mekhail, University of Toronto
Palmitoylation of SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein is prevented by Fatty Acid Synthase Inhibitors
12:15 Maxime Boutry, University of Toronto
ORP1L mediated PI(4)P transfer from lysosomes contributes to mitochondrial division
12:35 Tristen Hewitt, University of Guelph
Calcium signaling dysregulation in bipolar disorder iPSC-derived neural progenitor cells results in aberrant neurodevelopment
1:00-1:40 Lightning talks (~6 talks per session x 3 concurrent sessions)
Session 9: Cell Biology of disease (Chair: Shaun Sanders)
Devika Jayawardena The role of the TIMP/metalloproteinase balance in human septic PMVEC barrier dysfunction
Shyong Quan Yap Loss of mfsd8 in Dictyostelium discoideum affects growth and multicellular development stages
Sergiu Lucaciu Perturbed Gap Junction Turnover Underlies Erythrokeratodermia Variabilis et Progressiva Caused by Novel Connexin 43 Mutants
William Kim Revealing aberrant biological pathways associated with cln5-deficiency through a transcriptomics approach using Dictyostelium
Rhett Figliuzzi Erythrokeratodermia Variabilis et Progressiva (EKVP) linked Cx30.3 mutants can be selectively rescued by co-expression of wildtype keratinocyte connexins
Session 10: Signal transduction 2 (Chair: Andrew Craig)
Hanad Adan Activated Src requires Cadherin-11, Rac and gp130 for Stat3 activation in mouse Balb/c3T3 fibroblasts
Joyce Ang IRAK3 deficiency promotes development of early onset inflammatory bowel disease
Adam McTague O-GlcNAc homeostasis regulates expression and secretion of galectins in HL-60 cells
Dafne Vural Regulation of epidermal growth factor receptor by clathrin- associated kinases
Timothy J. Walker Altered RET Trafficking Contributes to Oncogenicity in TMEM127-depleted Cells
Lauar Monteiro Leptin signaling boosts macrophage responses and determines immunometabolic outcomes in obesity
Session 11: Pathogens, infection and immunity (Chair: Costin Antonescu)
Anat Usatinsky Engineering protein reagents towards the development of a portable immunoassay to detect SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies
Gillian Okura Therapeutic Potential of Novel Boron-Containing Compounds against NL63 Coronavirus Infection
Daniel Rappaport To the Root of the problem: Preventing excess copper waste and remediation, by targeted treatment of downy mildew in grape crops
Alexandra Williams Phagocytosis of Filamentous Fungi by Macrophages
Harpreet Jat Investigation Of Complement C3 Activation And Expression In Skeletal Muscle Myotubes Under Pro-Inflammatory Cytokine Stress
Friday, July 16th
11:30 Opening and welcome
11:40-12:25 Keynote
Sonya MacParland, University of Toronto
Leveraging single-cell transcriptomics to understand the cellular microenvironment of the liver in health and disease
12:30-1:30 Cancer Cell Biology
12:30 Fereshteh Moradi, Brock University
The effects of O2 and media compositions on cancer cells
12:50 Brittney Messam, Western University
The receptor for hyaluronan-mediated motility as a regulator of drug sensitivity in triple-negative breast cancer
1:10 Rebecca Cabral-Dias, Ryerson University
Epidermal growth factor receptor signaling requires specialized clathrin-labeled structures and necessary accessory protein Fyn and TOM1L1
ORGANIZING COMMITTEE AND CONTACTS
The organizing committee for the 2021 Ontario Cell Biology Symposium is:
Robin Duncan (University of Waterloo)
Andrew Wilde (University of Toronto)
Peter Kim (SickKids)
Shaun Sanders (University of Guelph)
Jonathan Lee (University of Ottawa)
Michael Scheid (York University)
Andrew Craig (Queen's University)
Lisa Porter (University of Windsor)
Nica Borradaile (Western university)
Shaiya Robinson (McMaster University)
Costin Antonescu (Ryerson University)
For more information, please contact ontariocellbiology@gmail.com