Grant: Planning and Dissemination Grant - Institute Community Support

The fast-moving world of cancer research presents unique challenges due to the complex and varied nature of cancer genomes. The future of cancer treatment is precision oncology, where treatments are matched to the unique DNA in a patient's cancer. This improves patient outcomes by prescribing therapies that are more effective and have fewer side effects than traditional approaches. However, the research needed to make precise treatment possible, creates massive amounts of data, and understanding these datasets takes advanced and specialized skills in computational analysis. To ensure that Canada has a workforce with the up-to-date expertise required to lead cancer research, the Canadian Bioinformatics Workshops (CBW) is seeking funding from CIHR to support the development and delivery of a six-day Cancer Analysis workshop. CBW has not offered a cancer-focused workshop since 2021, and the speed at which cancer research advances means that the curriculum needs to be completely redeveloped. Through lectures and hands-on labs using real cancer data, participants will learn the key elements of cancer bioinformatics. They will learn to navigate cancer databases, process genomic data, determine genetic variation in DNA, RNA, and single-cell datasets, and integrate these findings in research and clinical contexts while avoiding data bias. There will be an emphasis on patient experience through a module on matching individuals to appropriate treatments and a patient partner keynote. This comprehensive curriculum will empower participants to perform translational cancer research and advance the field of personalized oncology.