By Laura Eggertson

From finding ways to stop an aggressive breast cancer from spreading, to using surgical robots to personalize osteoarthritis treatment, Faculty of Medicine researchers presented their solutions to pressing health challenges at Dalhousie’s Engagement Day on May 2.

Eight researchers from the Faculty spoke about their research and described their projects or centres, during four-minute, four-slide fastTalks’ rounds at the day-long event at the Weldon Law Building, including:

• Kevin Nguyen, a master’s student in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics, described his thesis project on Triple Negative Breast Cancer. This form of breast cancer is likely to spread and does not respond well to hormone therapy or common forms of chemotherapy that are effective against other types of breast cancer.

Nguyen studies the role of a protein called SLC17A9 in a metabolic process that promotes the spread of Triple Negative Breast Cancer.

Using a preclinical model of the disease, Nguyen blocked the protein and observed the cell growth division and migration, to see if cancerous cells would spread.

“Without SLC17AD, the number of cancer cells is much lower,” Nguyen said.

His results, which appear to confirm the essential role SLC17A9 plays in the spread of this cancer, “provides a new treatment strategy” for Triple Negative Breast Cancer, he told the audience at the fastTalks’ seminar.

• Dr. Janie Astephen Wilson, a Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering and an adjunct professor in Department of Surgery, described the difficulty of tailoring joint replacement surgery to the needs of people’s individual gaits.
• Nova Scotia has the highest average rate of osteoarthritis in the country, Dr. Astephen Wilson said, and joint replacement is the ultimate treatment.
• Currently, Nova Scotians wait a long time for surgery, because “the burden outpaces the resources,” she said.
• Even after surgery, many patients are dissatisfied with its outcome, she added.
• Because people naturally walk differently, joint replacement that does not take their personal gaits into consideration can leave them with less mobility than they had before getting a new knee or hip.
• “We really do need some improved, objective tools to support triage and begin to support personalization of surgery,” Dr. Astephen Wilson said.
• Using personal measurement units that researchers place on patients, combined with real-time data from cameras that record them walking, and AI-driven assessments, Dr. Astephen Wilson is creating a virtual triage tool that will help doctors take people’s personal mechanics into account when prioritizing and designing robotic-assisted surgeries.
• Fibrosis, the scarring or hardening of tissues and organs, is a hallmark of many chronic inflammatory diseases, and its end stage results in up to 40 percent of deaths in the developed world. Dr. Jean Marshall, a Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, described research she and Dr. Mike Bezuhly are pursuing into the use of mast cells to trigger the body’s ability to tackle fibrosis.

“We know the body is capable of reducing fibrosis,” Dr. Marshall said. “We want to find ways to harness natural resolution processes.”

Dr. Marshall and Dr. Bezuhly used skin tissue models to see what would happen if they removed mast cells. They discovered that fibrosis did not resolve properly without those cells.

By contrast, the researchers also observed the effects of adding human mast cell products to the skin.

“We have shown that the presence of mast cells and a specific chemical produced by mast cells can help resolve fibrosis,” she told the audience.

Dr. Marshall and her colleagues now hope to attract the funding for a clinical trial to test safe, effective treatments for fibrosis that use mast cells.

Dr. John Sapp, Dr. Gabriela Ilie, Louise Tunnah, Dr. Jeanette Boudreau, and Dr. Ruth Lavergne also presented at Engagement Day, which Dalhousie hopes to make an annual event to highlight the ways in which the university is serving not only residents of Nova Scotia, but those beyond our borders.