Grant: CIHR Fellowship

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic debilitating disease caused by damage to the brain. Treatments only manage symptoms, but there is currently no cure to halt disease. Patients with MS present with a range of clinical symptoms. The progression of disease also varies considerably and is highly unpredictable. This has become a major ongoing challenge for both clinicians and patients. My project aims to discover new biological markers, or biomarkers, that can be measured in blood and used to predict how a patient's disease will progress. In MS patients, there is a 'cellular war' - millions of white blood cells fight to attack the brain. I must first understand which specific cells are leading this war and what is telling these cells to attack. DNA, the 'book of life', is the manual that will dictate a cell's actions, and I want to discover the pages in this manual that are instructing cells to be destructive. I believe there will be unique pages, or DNA signatures, that will be found in MS patients. To achieve this, I will use single-cell sequencing, a revolutionary technique that can zoom into the DNA manual of single blood cells. I am involved in the large Canadian Prospective Cohort study, which has enrolled 900 MS patients. I have already received funding ($1.8 mil) for my project to use single cell sequencing and this comprehensive clinical database to discover new biomarkers. My work will be able to predict the progression of MS disease to allow clinicians to best treat their patients. This will provide peace of mind to patients with their diagnosis to ultimately improve the quality of life of people with MS.