Each department in the Faculty of Medicine is taking part in an external review this year. This review process will evaluate the quality of our academic program and research and the experience of the faculty and students. The MBP Executive has designed a survey which will help us to get student input on areas such as the application process, the academic environment, the curriculum, supervision and overall culture.The results will be included in a report to the review committee.

The survey links were sent out by Chau on Tuesday, February 14, so please check your email for this important message. It should take only about 15 minutes to complete and your responses will be totally anonymous. We hope that you will all complete the survey so that the report will be as representative of the students’ opinions as possible.

The deadline for the student report is coming up very quickly, so please fill out your survey ASAP!

Hey MBP!

The annual MBP Open House is Saturday, January 7, 2012 from 9:30 am to 2:30 pm. We need YOUR HELP to showcase our department! Please sign up to volunteer!

If you have any questions, please direct them to Josh (josh.n.durbin@gmail.com) or Diana (diana.merino@utoronto.ca).

Thanks!
Your Open House Team

Do you have your student seminar coming up? Do you want to make this seminar the BEST one you’ve ever given? If so, then your MBP GSU is here to help! We’ve assembled a super-star team of graduate students who (a) have all done well on their own student seminars in the past, (b) are from all fields of MBP, and (c) are enthusiastic and want to give you CONSTRUCTIVE criticism on your seminar!

If you’re interested in receiving help preparing for YOUR seminar, please contact Greg Anderson (gregory.anderson@utoronto.ca) as soon as possible!

Every fall, current MBP students volunteer to visit undergraduate classes at nearby universities to promote the MBP graduate program.

The goals of this program include:

• Generating interest among senior undergraduate students toward graduate studies in MBP
• Promoting awareness of current research opportunities in our department
• Advertising the MBP Open House event (Saturday, January 7, 2012)

After you sign up, we’ll hook you up with a team and send you some information to help you plan your visit. Some travel and meal expenses are reimbursable. If you have questions or would like more information, please contact Josh (josh.n.durbin@gmail.com) or Diana (diana651@gmail.com).

Applying for scholarships this fall? The MBPGSU is piloting a new project to help you out. Join us Monday, September 12th from 4-5pm in room 7-605 at PMH for an organizational meeting and to find out more about how the program will work.

What: Scholarship Workshops
When: Mondays 4-5pm, room 7-605 PMH from September 12th to October 10th

Questions? Contact Shawn Stapleton (s.stapleton@utoronto.ca) for more information.

By Diana Merino

Each month we will review/feature an article published by one of our very own MBP students in the biology and/or physics stream.

This article features the publication “Biochemical and imaging surveillance in germline TP53 mutation carriers with Li-Fraumeni syndrome: a prospective observational study” by Villani et al., Lancet Oncol. 2011 Jun; 12(6): 559-67. (PMID: 21601526) [Link to Paper]

Click! That’s all it takes to get your genome sequenced nowadays. But how would you benefit from knowing the genetic code that determines the most infinitesimal details of your being? What could you do with this information?

Imagine you sequence your genome and an underlying disease predisposition is uncovered in between your millions of T’s, C’s, A’s, and G’s…what would you do now? Would you benefit from subjecting yourself to constant tests and medical examinations with the hope of preventing disease? Read the rest

There is a proposal to change the Student Seminars schedule so that students speak at their home location. This will result in fewer physics students speaking downtown and fewer biology students speaking uptown. Both locations will still have talks from senior PhD students, 2nd year students and 1st year students.

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Additional comments can be posted as a comment to this post or emailed to mbpgsu@gmail.com.

By Alison Aiken

This post highlights the work of Ryan Draker from Dr. Peter Cheung’s lab, published earlier this year in Nucleic Acids Research (PMID: 21245042) [Link to Paper].

In order for DNA to fit into cells, it gets coiled around octamers of small, positively charged proteins: the histones. Two each of histones H2A, H2B, H3 and H4 form the core of the nucleosome, around which DNA is coiled. Variant histones, which can differ significantly from core histones in their amino acid composition, can replace core histones in the nucleosome and are normally deposited in specific regions. A variant of H2A, H2A.Z, has been implicated in several cellular processes, including the regulation of transcription. Interestingly, H2A.Z can have either a positive or negative influence on gene transcription. This histone variant can be post-translationally modified by either acetylation or mono-ubiquitylation. Previous work by the Cheung lab has shown that H2A.Z is ubiquitylated by Ring1b, an E3 ligase that is part of the Polycomb Repressive Complex 1, and that mono-ubiquitylated H2A.Z is associated with transcriptionally inactive chromatin. The authors hypothesize, therefore, that the deubiquitylase(s) for H2A.Z would play an important role in the activation of transcription. Read the rest

The James Lepock Memorial Student Research Symposium is set for June 2, 2011 at Princess Margaret Hospital. This annual event is organized in the style of a scientific conference and is an opportunity for MBP graduate students to showcase their research activities. It’s a great way to get exposure within our community and to gain experience in making poster and oral presentations.

Program and more information about the symposium