Amina Zoubeidi | |
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Academic background | |
Education | Bsc, Mohammed V University M.Sc. Université du Québec à Montréal PhD, Université de Montréal |
Academic work | |
Institutions | University of British Columbia Vancouver Coastal Health |
Amina Zoubeidi is a Canadian research scientist and prostate cancer researcher. She's a scientist at the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute and an associate professor in the Department of Urologic Sciences at the University of British Columbia. During her tenure at UBC,Zoubeidi and her research team developed the first drug that targets and blocks BRN2,thus stopping Neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC) tumours and creating a possible treatment for the previously thought incurable disease. [1] [2]
Zoubeidi earned her Bachelor of Science degree from the Mohammed V University before moving to Montreal to earn her graduate degrees from the Universitédu Québec àMontréal and Universitéde Montréal. [3]
Zoubeidi joined the Department of Urologic Sciences at the University of British Columbia as an assistant professor in 2010. [4] In the same year,she was also the recipient of a Prostate Cancer Foundation Durden Foundation Young Investigator Award to fund her research on determining the function of Hsp27 in cancer treatment. [5] She continued her research into Hsp27 and received funding from the Michael Smith Career Investigator Award for her project Adaptive Stress Response Signaling Driving Treatment Resistance and Metastasis in Cancer. [6]
While serving in her role as an assistant professor,in collaboration with Vancouver Coastal Health,Zoubeidi continued to search for a cure for prostate cancer and led her research team to numerous discoveries. Zoubeidi and her research team designed a mouse model of Neuroendocrine Prostate Cancer (NEPC) to identify that BRN2 was essential for NEPC to develop. [7] She firstly used genome editing CRISPR technology to freeze the gene producing the protein driving the emergence of NPEC for the first time. [8] Following this discovery,she earned a three-year Translation Acceleration Grant from Prostate Cancer Canada and Movember to fund a project to develop blockers of BRN2,a gene linked to the growth of aggressive NPEC. [9] [10] She subsequently became the first female scientist to earn a Translation Acceleration Grant from Prostate Cancer Canada and Movember [11] and later earned the 2018 UBC Faculty of Medicine Distinguished Achievement Award. [12]
By 2019,Zoubeidi and her research team developed the first drug that targets and blocks BRN2,thus stopping NEPC tumours and creating a possible treatment for the previously thought incurable disease. They also modified the drug so it could be tested in clinical trials on humans. [11] [13] Similarly,her project The role of the lineage oncogene ASCL1 in treatment-induced neuroendocrine prostate cancer received funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. [14] She was eventually promoted to the rank of Full professor as a result of her "contributions within the UBC community and her outstanding research career to date." [15]
Michael Smith was a British-born Canadian biochemist and businessman. He shared the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Kary Mullis for his work in developing site-directed mutagenesis. Following a PhD in 1956 from the University of Manchester,he undertook postdoctoral research with Har Gobind Khorana at the British Columbia Research Council in Vancouver,British Columbia,Canada. Subsequently,Smith worked at the Fisheries Research Board of Canada Laboratory in Vancouver before being appointed a professor of biochemistry in the UBC Faculty of Medicine in 1966. Smith's career included roles as the founding director of the UBC Biotechnology Laboratory and the founding scientific leader of the Protein Engineering Network of Centres of Excellence (PENCE). In 1996 he was named Peter Wall Distinguished Professor of Biotechnology. Subsequently,he became the founding director of the Genome Sequencing Centre at the BC Cancer Research Centre.
Movember is an annual event involving the growing of moustaches during the month of November to raise awareness of men's health issues,such as prostate cancer,testicular cancer,and men's suicide. It is a portmanteau of the Australian-English diminutive word for moustache,"mo",and "November". The Movember Foundation runs the Movember charity event,housed at Movember.com. The goal of Movember is to "change the face of men's health."
Vancouver General Hospital is a medical facility located in Vancouver,British Columbia. It is the largest facility in the Vancouver Hospital and Health Sciences Centre (VHHSC) group of medical facilities. VGH is Canada's third largest hospital by bed count,after Hamilton General Hospital,and Foothills Medical Centre.
Judy Illes,,PHD,FRSC,FCAHS,is Professor of Neurology and Distinguished University Scholar in Neuroethics at the University of British Columbia. She is Director of Neuroethics Canada at UBC,and faculty in the Brain Research Centre at UBC and at the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute. She also holds affiliate appointments in the School of Population and Public Health and the School of Journalism at UBC,and in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington in Seattle,WA. USA. She was appointed a member of the Order of Canada in 2017.
Simon J. Hall is an American researcher who is the Associate Professor and Kyung Hyun Kim,M.D. Chair of Urology and Assistant Professor,Department of Gene and Cell Medicine at The Mount Sinai School of Medicine,as well as the Director of the Barbara and Maurice Deane Prostate Health and Research Center at The Mount Sinai Medical Center,both in New York City.
Michael R. Hayden,is a Killam Professor of Medical Genetics at the University of British Columbia,the highest honour UBC can confer on any faculty member. Only four such awards have ever been conferred in the Faculty of Medicine. Dr. Hayden is also Canada Research Chair in Human Genetics and Molecular Medicine. Hayden is best known for his research in Huntington disease (HD).
The Vancouver Prostate Centre (VPC) is a prostate cancer translational research centre located in Vancouver,British Columbia. It is a UBC and VGH Centre of Excellence and a designated national Centre of Excellence for Commercialization and Research. The VPC is hosted by the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute and the Department of Urologic Sciences,Faculty of Medicine,University of British Columbia.
Rosetta Martiniello-Wilks is an Australian cancer researcher. She is a former senior lecturer at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) in Ultimo,Sydney,Australia. Martiniello-Wilks was a core member of the Centre for Health Technologies at UTS and head of the Translational Cancer Research Group in the School of Medical and Molecular Biosciences,Faculty of Science,UTS.
Colleen Nelson is a scientist in prostate cancer research. She founded and directs the Australian Prostate Cancer Research Centre –Queensland (APCRC-Q). The Centre,based at the Translational Research Institute and the Princess Alexandra Hospital,spans the spectrum of discovery of new therapeutic targets and their preclinical and clinical development. She is also Chair of Prostate Cancer Research at Queensland University of Technology (QUT).
Nadine Rena Caron FACS,FRCSC,,is a Canadian surgeon. She is the first Canadian female general surgeon of First Nations descent (Ojibway),as well as the first female First Nations student to graduate from University of British Columbia's medical school.
Caroline M. Moore is the first woman to be made a professor of urology in the United Kingdom. She works in the diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer at University College London.
Suzanne Kathleen Chambers,is a Professor and Dean of the Faculty of Health at Sydney's University of Technology. She specialises in psycho-oncology,and has received Queen's Birthday honours. Chambers has worked on psycho-oncology,prostate cancer,health economics and psychological interventions including the distress and adjustments after cancer.
Susan E. Quaggin is a Canadian nephrologist. She is the Charles Horace Mayo Professor of Medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine,Director of the Feinberg Cardiovascular Research Institute,prior chief of the Division of Nephrology,now Chair of the Department of Medicine.
Pamela Lyn Kunz is an American oncologist. She is the leader of the Gastrointestinal Cancers Program at Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital and director of GI Medical Oncology within the Section of Medical Oncology. She was formerly the director of the Stanford Neuroendocrine Tumor Program before leaving,in part due to harassment. Kunz was also recognized as one of the 100 Influential Women in Oncology by OncoDaily.
Janice Jennifer Eng is a professor in the University of British Columbia's Department of Physical Therapy and Canada Research Chair in Neurological Rehabilitation.
Deborah McColl Money is a Canadian obstetric and gynaecological infectious disease specialist. As a professor at the University of British Columbia,she was the first non-US President of the Infectious Diseases Society for Obstetrics and Gynecology from 2010 until 2012.
Gina Suzanne Ogilvie is a Canadian global and public health physician. She is a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Global Control of HPV related diseases and prevention,and Professor at the University of British Columbia in their School of Population and Public Health.
Kathleen Anne Martin Ginis is a Canadian exercise behavioural scientist. She is a Full professor in the Department of Medicine and in the School of Health and Exercise Sciences at the University of British Columbia. She also holds the Reichwald Family UBC Southern Medical Program Chair in Preventive Medicine. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.
Helen M. Burt is a British-Canadian pharmaceutical scientist who is the Angiotech Professor of Drug Delivery at the University of British Columbia. She serves as Associate Vice President of Research and Innovation at UBC. Her research considers novel therapeutics based on nanotechnology,including drug delivery systems for the treatment of bladder cancer and coronary artery disease.
Folakemi Titilayo Odedina is a Nigerian-born scientist and professor of pharmacy and medicine at the University of Florida. She is the principal investigator for the Prostate Cancer Transatlantic Consortium (CaPTC),a clinical research group using genomic science and environmental etiology to exploring disproportionate burden of prostate cancer among Black men funded by the NCI. She is a member of American Cancer Society's National Prostate Cancer Disparities Advisory Team.