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

Breast cancer (BC), prostate cancer (PC), and colorectal cancer (CRC) are three leading causes of cancer in both incidence rates and mortality worldwide. This trend holds true for Canada; in 2015 25.9% and 11.9% of newly diagnosed cases in women were BC and CRC, respectively, and 23.9% and 13.9% of newly diagnosed cases in men were PC and CRC, respectively. This totals nearly 10,000 deaths from these three cancers alone in 2015. Current cancer screening tests are limited. Both BC and CRC do not have any form of blood screening test for diagnosis or prognosis. PC has a blood test, commonly known as the PSA (prostate-specific antigen) test, however it is highly inaccurate with over-diagnosis rates of up to 67%. Screening tests often look for biological markers in blood or urine for an indication of the presence of a specific cancer. These biomarkers can be larger compounds, such as proteins, or smaller compounds, such as metabolites. An approach to look for both proteins and metabolites will be used to discover novel biomarkers for each cancer. A unique aspect of this research will be looking at correlations between the proteins and metabolites analyzed in the tissues. Relationships between proteins and metabolites will not only uncover novel biomarkers, but will lead to a better understanding of the cancer within the patient. Technology with higher sensitivity than the current methods will be used in order to detect compounds at lower concentrations, as it is often these that are unique to the cancer. The tools and techniques applied for this research are easily adapted for many different types of cancers and diseases. The overall goal of this research is to develop novel screening tests for both diagnosis and prognosis of breast cancer, prostate cancer, and colorectal cancer.