Ace Chan
Doctor of Philosophy in Population and Public Health (PhD)
Primary prevention of cancers-related to tobacco and alcohol use in gender diverse communities across Canada
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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 |
---|---|---|
Fischer, Lisa | Department of Family Practice | sport concussion |
Fisher, Charles | Department of Orthopaedics | adult spine surgery, with special clinical and research interests in trauma, oncology and evidence-based medicine |
Fisher, Cynthia | Basic medicine and life sciences; Medical and biomedical engineering; Biological sciences; Health sciences; Stem cells and regenerative medicine; Epigenetics and chromatin level regulation of gene expression; Hematopoiesis and immunology | |
Flannigan, Ryan | Department of Urologic Sciences | evaluating genetic and molecular mechanisms contributing to non-obstructive azoospermia (NOA) |
Fleetham, John | Division of Respiratory Medicine | Sleep disorders, neuromuscular disorders, obstructive sleep apnea, imaging techniques, respiratory muscle function, systemic blood pressure, hypothalamic pituitary function, psychological status, disordered breathing |
Fong, Anthony | Medical, health and life sciences; Media and communications; disaster medicine; health journalism | |
Forbes, Connor | Department of Urologic Sciences | Urology; Other basic medicine and life sciences; Drug discovery, design and delivery; Endourology; Minimally Invasive Surgery; Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia; Kidney stones; Translational research |
Forster, Bruce | Department of Radiology | Radiology; imaging |
Forwell, Susan | Department of Occupational Science & Occupational Therapy | Neurological conditions and their impact on chosen occupations |
Foster, Leonard | Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, Michael Smith Laboratories | Biochemistry; Genomics; Agriculture; antigen presentation; Bioinformatics; Biological and Biochemical Mechanisms; Biotechnology; Cell Signaling and Infectious and Immune Diseases; Honey bees; host-pathogen interactions; Immune System; Microbiology; Proteomics; Systems Biology |
Francis, Gordon | Division of Endocrinology | lipoproteins; Cholesterol metabolism; Cardiovascular risk factors; Prevention of cardiovascular disease and diabetes; High density lipoproteins (HDL) |
Frangou, Sophia | Department of Psychiatry | the study of the human brain in health and disease |
Frank, Erica | School of Population and Public Health | Health sciences; Public and population health; Other education; Free accredited education; Preventive Medicine; Sustainable Architecture and Landscape Architecture; Holocaust studies; Exile Reintegration |
Freeman, Hugh James | Division of Gastroenterology | Intestinal Diseases |
Friedman, Jan Marshall | Department of Medical Genetics | Other clinical medicine; Genetic medicine; Genomics; Health counselling; Application of whole genome sequencing to diagnose genetic disease; Birth defects epidemiology; Clinical genomics; Developmental Genetics; Genetics and Heredity; Neurofibromatosis |
Gadermann, Anne | Social determinants of health; Housing and homelessness; Quality of | |
Gallagher, Romayne | Medical, health and life sciences; palliative care, pain and symptom management | |
Gao, Zu-Hua | Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine | |
Garbuz, Donald | Department of Orthopaedics | reconstructive surgery of the hip and knee; novel imaging techniques to assess early changes in articular cartilage, which may be indicators for osteoarthritis |
Garnis, Catherine | Department of Surgery | Cancer biology; Tumor progression; Oral premalignant lesions; Head and neck cancer; RNA biology, microRNAs; Alternative splicing; Biomarkers |
Ge, Ruiyang | Neuropsychology; Mood Disorder; Big Data; mental illness | |
Geller, Josie | Department of Psychiatry | Eating Disorders |
Geoffrion, Roxana | Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology | patient education, surgical outcomes after various pelvic reconstructive surgeries and surgical skill development through simulation and standardized training; pelvic floor reconstruction procedures such as vaginal prolapse or urinary incontinence surgery |
Gerrie, Alina | Division of Medical Oncology | Clinical medicine; Lymphoid Cancer; Leukemia; genomics; Population-based outcomes; Cellular therapy; Quality of life; Survivorship |
Giaschi, Deborah | Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences | Neurosciences, medical and physiological and health aspects; Neurosciences, biological and chemical aspects; amblyopia; reading; dyslexia; motion perception; binocular vision; visual development |
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 |
---|---|---|
2023 | A family of viruses called dicistroviruses contains many copies of a protein, a rarity for viruses. Dr. Warsaba investigated the reasons for this and explored the conservation of this duplication. Reid found that these viruses duplicate this protein to produce the correct amounts of their viral proteins, revealing insights into virus evolution. | Doctor of Philosophy in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (PhD) |
2023 | Dr. Aceves investigated the effects of non-invasive brain stimulation in healthy brains. Her research centered on the evaluation of neurotransmission and brain function, providing insights into the therapeutic applications of this brain-stimulation technique. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
2023 | Dr. Stubbs studied how traumatic brain injury affects the health of people who are homeless. He identified that serious brain injury is common in this population, and he used quantitative brain imaging to show how it affects health and functioning over time. His findings have implications for individual-level treatments and system-level policies. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
2023 | Dr. Trinder showed that common and rare genetic variation can be used to predict an individual's risk of cardiovascular disease. He used these findings to implement genetic testing for cardiovascular disorders at St. Paul's Hospital's Healthy Heart Program. This work highlights the promise of genomic medicine for preventing and treating cardiac disease. | Doctor of Medicine and Doctor of Philosophy (MDPhD) |
2023 | Dr. Wells studied how our DNA faces internal obstacles and proposed a model featuring multiple repair pathways that work to tolerate this stress and prevent DNA damage. This work enhances our understanding of genome instability, a feature of cancer development and treatment. | Doctor of Philosophy in Interdisciplinary Oncology (PhD) |
2023 | Dr. Ge developed novel drugs targeting GluN2B-containing NMDA receptors and demonstrated that these drugs improved learning and memory in rat models. This research generated a potential pharmacotherapy for various learning disabilities. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
2023 | Dr. Wang investigated how YAP1 gene regulates the differentiation of progenitor cells in the pancreas. He provided new evidence that manipulation of YAP1 expression controls pancreatic size and function during embryogenesis. His research shed light on the future development of cell therapy for type 1/2 diabetes and pancreatic cancer. | Doctor of Philosophy in Cell and Developmental Biology (PhD) |
2023 | Dr. Vaikakkara Chithran's work explores how neural circuits are maintained in the adult nervous system. She demonstrated that axon guidance cues are essential for the survival of adult neurons. Her research also contributed to the development of a novel tauopathy model to study how protein toxicity leads to neurodegeneration and neuronal death. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
2023 | Dr. Skinnider used machine learning to identify proteins that physically interact in living tissues. His work revealed how inherited mutations, present in every cell in the body, can cause dysfunction in just a single tissue. | Doctor of Medicine and Doctor of Philosophy (MDPhD) |
2023 | Dr. Sridhar studied regions of close contact between parts of a cell using budding yeast. She studied the role of previously uncharacterized proteins in maintaining steady state levels of lipids at these sites. Similar proteins are present in humans and could have a role in disease biology. | Doctor of Philosophy in Cell and Developmental Biology (PhD) |