April Mazzuca
Doctor of Philosophy in Population and Public Health (PhD)
The Cedar Project: Evaluating a culturally-safe program to support the delivery of optimal treatment of hepatitis C among Indigenous people who use drugs in British Columbia.
Applicants to Master’s and Doctoral degrees are not affected by the recently announced cap on study permits. Review more details
Ranked among the world’s top medical schools with the fifth-largest MD enrollment in North America, the UBC Faculty of Medicine is a leader in both the science and the practice of medicine. Across British Columbia, more than 12,000 faculty and staff are training the next generation of doctors, health care professionals, and medical researchers, making remarkable discoveries to help create the pathways to better health for our communities at home and around the world.
The UBC Faculty of Medicine offers a diverse array of training opportunities including cutting-edge research experiences in the biosciences, globally recognized population health education, quality health professional training, as well as several certificate and online training options. The Faculty of Medicine is home to more than 1,700 graduate students housed in 20 graduate programs (14 of which offer doctoral research options). Year after year, research excellence in the Faculty of Medicine is supported by investment from funding sources here at home and around the globe, receiving approximately more than $1.8B in total research funding since 2016.
We value our trainees and the creative input they have to scholarly activities at UBC. Our priority is to enable their maximum potential through flexible opportunities that provide a breadth of experiences tailored to their own individual career objectives. We maintain high standards of excellence, and work to create a community of intellectually and socially engaged scholars that work collaboratively with each other, the university, and the world, with the overarching goal of promoting the health of individuals and communities.
Most Faculty research is conducted under the auspices of 23 centres and institutes that are part of UBC or affiliated with it, in collaboration with our health partners.
UBC Faculty of Medicine provides innovative educational and research programs in the areas of health and life sciences through an integrated and province-wide delivery model in facilities at locations throughout British Columbia.
The Life Sciences Centre is the largest building on the UBC Vancouver campus. Completed in 2004, the $125 million, 52,165 sq metres building was built to accommodate the distributed medical educational program and the Life Sciences Institute.
The Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health (DMCBH), a partnership between the University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health, unites under one roof research and clinical expertise in neuroscience, psychiatry and neurology in order to accelerate discovery and translate new knowledge into better treatment and prevention strategies. DMCBH has both laboratory and clinical research areas within the Centre proper and in the UBC Hospital Koerner Pavilion. Our core facilities are essential to ongoing collaboration, teaching, and research.
The BC Children's Hospital Research Institute is it the largest research institute of its kind in Western Canada in terms of people, productivity, funding and size. With more than 350,000 square feet of space, the Institute has both 'wet bench' laboratory and 'dry lab' clinical research areas, and other areas to facilitate particular areas of research and training.
New knowledge and innovation are crucial to successfully identifying, addressing and overcoming the increasingly complex health-related challenges that influence the lives of all of us – in British Columbia, in Canada, and in countries and communities around the globe.
The UBC Faculty of Medicine is recognized nationally and internationally for research innovation that advances knowledge and translates new discoveries to improve the health and well-being of individuals and communities. Research opportunities feature extensive collaborations across other faculties, health institutions and health partners across British Columbia, Canada and internationally.
The Faculty provides and fosters research excellence across the full continuum, from basic science to applied science and then to knowledge implementation, with a focus on precision health; cancer; brain and mental health; heart and lung health; population health; and chronic diseases.
Name | Academic Unit(s) | Research Interests |
---|---|---|
Loree, Jonathan | Division of Medical Oncology | Cancer; Carcinoid tumors |
Lorincz, Matthew | Department of Medical Genetics | Genetic medicine; Developmental Genetics; genomics; chromatin; Development; Epigenetics; Epigenomics; Gene regulation |
Loucks, Catrina | Department of Pediatrics, Department of Anesthesiology, Pharmacology & Therapeutics | Medical, health and life sciences; Pharmacogenomics; Pain management; Medical Genetics; Model organism genetics; Drug reactions |
Luciani, Dan | Department of Surgery | Cell metabolism; Cell differentiation, proliferation and death; Organelle function; Other basic medicine and life sciences; Diabetes; Pancreatic beta-cell function and failure; Mitochondrial physiology; Lysosomal physiology; Cell calcium signalling; Cell stress signalling; Mechanisms of cell death; autophagy; Cellular senescence; fluorescence microscopy |
Lui, Harvey | Department of Dermatology & Skin Science | lasers; skin disease; psoriasis; dermatology; pigmentary disorders; vitiligo; applied optics; photomedicine; photodynamic therapy, Dermatology, photomedicine, lasers, psoriasis, vitiligo, dermatologic education |
Lunken, Genelle | Department of Pediatrics | Clinical nutrition; Human nutrition and dietetics, n.e.c.; Gastroenterology; Personalised nutrition therapies; Dietary fibre; Inflammatory bowel disease; Gut microbiome; Food additives |
Luo, Honglin | Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine | Basic medicine and life sciences; Viral Infections; Cardiomyopathy; Innate immunity; Central Nervous System Inflammatory Diseases; Enteroviral infection and neurodegeneration; Oncolytic virus; Protein quality control in cardiac remodeling; RNA viruses |
Lynn, Francis | Department of Surgery, School of Biomedical Engineering | Diabetes; ß-cell development; ß-cell biology; Human pluripotent stem cells; CRISPR/Cas; transcriptional regulation |
Lyons, Christopher | Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences | Pediatric Ophthalmology; Oculoplastics |
MacAskill, Don | Health services and systems; Medicine, nursing and health curriculum, pedagogy and didactics; paediatric audiology, paediatric hearing loss and balance function; Innovative practice; Leadership | |
MacHan, Lindsay | Department of Radiology | radiology; infertility; vascular disease |
Mackenzie, Ian | Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine | Alzheimer's Disease |
MacLure, Malcolm | Department of Anesthesiology, Pharmacology & Therapeutics | Epidemiology, patient safety, quality control, pharmaceutical sciences, health services research |
Macnab, Andrew | Department of Pediatrics | Developmental Neurosciences, Child Health, Diabetes, Nutrition & Metabolism (Nutrition & Metabolism) |
MacNab, Ying | School of Population and Public Health | Bayesian paradigm, foundations of statistics, space-time statistics, structured statistical models, taxonomic models, item response theory, inductive reasoning, Bayesian burden of disease methodology, Geometics, Health service and population health geoinformation system, and meta-data innovation in medical and health research |
MacNeily, Andrew | Department of Urologic Sciences | Evidence to Innovation; Care of children with urological conditions |
MacVicar, Brian | Department of Psychiatry | Brain Research, epilepsy, astrocyte, glia, dendrites, synapse, imaging, two photon laser scanning microscopy, neurophysiology, Role of calcium, regulation of neurons, cell death |
Madden, Kenneth | Division of Geriatric Medicine | Geriatrics and gerontology; Exercise interventions; Sedentary Behaviour; Syncope; Falls Prevention; Sarcopenia; Machine Learning |
Madhav, Manu | School of Biomedical Engineering | Neurosciences, medical and physiological and health aspects; Cognitive representations in the brain; Place cells; Spatial navigation; Path planning; Control theory; Alzheimer's disease |
Mancini, John | Divisions of Cardiology & Cardiovascular Surgery | Cardiology |
Manges, Amee | School of Population and Public Health | Health sciences; Immunology; Microbiology; Public and population health; Epidemiology; Molecular epidemiology; Public health |
Mannas, Miles | Department of Urologic Sciences | prostate cancer, novel techniques for real-time pathologic tissue analysis utilizing artificial intelligence |
Mantha, Alexandra | ||
Marinova-Todd, Stefka | School of Audiology and Speech Sciences | bilingualism, second language acquisition, language development, literacy, ESL children, children at risk of language difficulties, language disorders in bilingual children and adults, Second language acquisition; language development and language learning difficulties of bilingual children |
Marra, Marco | Department of Medical Genetics, Michael Smith Laboratories | Genomics; Bioinformatics, n.e.c.; Epigenetics and epigenomics; Genetics, n.e.c.; Cancer genetics; Genetics; Epigenomics; Cancer biology |
This is an incomplete sample of recent publications in chronological order by UBC faculty members with a primary appointment in the Faculty of Medicine.
Year | Citation | Program |
---|---|---|
2022 | Dr. Lim measured real-time brain activation during walking in individuals who have experienced a stroke. They were the first to measure sensorimotor integration regions of the brain during walking in this population. Activation changes were specific to the type of walking task and individuals who performed better showed higher activation levels. | Doctor of Philosophy in Rehabilitation Sciences (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Venkateswaran investigated the role of the interaction of a glutamine transporter with the metabolic enzyme, CA9 in hypoxic solid tumors. Her research work establishes a mechanism by which CA9 utilizes the amino acid, glutamine, to promote tumor growth and identifies novel targets to treat cancer. | Doctor of Philosophy in Interdisciplinary Oncology (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Francis investigated the effects of patient-ventilator asynchrony on the structure and function of the diaphragm in mechanically ventilated patients. This study illuminates the role sedation and ventilator settings play in patient-ventilator interaction, and makes recommendations that could improve outcomes in critically ill patients. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Tuengel studied age-related development of the immune system and immunity to viruses in a cohort of Ugandan infants.Her research identified how immune cells change with age and viral infections. Her findings increased understanding of healthy immune development during infancy and the changes that occur following viral infections early in life. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Sreenivasan investigated the importance of certain survival signals made up of cytokines that enable medulloblastoma cells to resist chemotherapy. Blocking these survival factors with inhibitors and cytotoxic drugs makes medulloblastoma cells susceptible to treatment and offers a novel approach to combat acquired chemotherapeutic resistance. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Asleh studied the most aggressive form of breast cancer called the basal-like type that lacks successful targeted treatments. Using breast tumor samples from women in Canada, she identified biomarkers that predict which women with basal-like breast cancers benefit most from chemotherapy and drugs targeting the immune system. | Doctor of Philosophy in Interdisciplinary Oncology (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Esfandiari developed an online self-management program for people with lower limb amputation, called Self-Management for Amputee Rehabilitation Using Technology or SMART. SMART potentially provides accessible, low-cost, education after discharge from hospital for patients in both urban and remote areas. | Doctor of Philosophy in Rehabilitation Sciences (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Cheung established a technique to measure oxygen levels in the injured spinal cord. She developed an implantable biosensor to monitor the spinal cord in a large animal model before its clinical translation. Her work will advance and improve the current clinical care of patients with spinal cord injury. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Qiu addressed the use of antidepressants in the postpartum for those who do not respond to treatment and aimed to understand what biological factors influence efficacy and found it to be affiliated with the immune system. Her work is intended to help postpartum individuals seeking antidepressants in better treatment decision-making. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
2022 | Dr. Zhang's dissertation revealed that it takes much longer than generally expected for high school students who speak English as a second language to catch up with their peers on academic language competency. It highlighted the importance of the language support offered in the schools for assuring the academic success of these students. | Doctor of Philosophy in Audiology and Speech Sciences (PhD) |