Grant: Doctoral Award - Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarships

Interstitial lung diseases (ILDs) are a group of disorders in which the lungs progressively get harder due to faulty tissue repair mechanisms. Ultimately this leads to decreased oxygen uptake into the blood and difficulty breathing, which can escalate into a series of life-threatening complications including respiratory or heart failure. Within the older Canadian population, ILDs have a comparable incidence and prevalence to breast and prostate cancer. Unfortunately, there are several subtypes of these diseases, and one of the major hurdles in effectively treating ILDs is distinguishing one subtype from another: many of the subtypes look similar on standard medical tests, but require vastly different treatments. As a result, diagnosis can take up to 5 years. Importantly, misdiagnosis of ILD subtypes and inappropriate treatment can actually worsen patient outcomes. The objective of my doctoral research project, therefore, is to improve ILD diagnosis by identifying key molecular differences between different ILD subtypes. I will use a 'big data' approach to compare the relative amounts of genes, proteins, and metabolites in blood samples from patients with different ILD subtypes. My goal is to use these findings to develop a simple blood-based test that can improve the diagnostic accuracy for ILD and potentially improve patient outcomes. An added benefit of this research will be the discovery of new biological targets against which we can develop new ILD treatments.