Life Sciences

U of T Mississauga launches SpinUp, a wet lab incubator for life science startups

siddiq22 — Wed, 07 Jun 2023 19:45:20 +0000

U of T Mississauga launches SpinUp, a wet lab incubator for life science startups

siddiq22 Wed, 06/07/2023 - 15:45

Cutline

Christina Kakaflikas, director of development with Mississauga’s Economic Development Office; Alexandra Gillespie, U of T Mississauga vice-president and principal; Bonnie Crombie, mayor of Mississauga; Kent Moore, U of T Mississauga vice-principal of research; and Jason Field, president and CEO of Life Sciences Ontario at the BIO 2023 convention in Boston (photo courtesy of City of Mississauga)

Ali Raza

Topic

Our Community

Entrepreneurship

Life Sciences

partnerships

Research & Innovation

Startups

U of T Mississauga

Subheadline

The new venture will provide affordable wet lab space to support early-stage companies and entrepreneurs

Young entrepreneurs or new start-up companies seeking to break into the prolific life sciences sector in the Greater Toronto Area can find resources and mentorship through the University of Toronto’s network of world-class accelerator programs.

A critical gap exists in that life science entrepreneurship pipeline that the university is seeking to address – providing affordable wet lab space (where drugs, chemicals and other types of liquid biological matter can be analyzed and tested) dedicated to early-stage founders.

This week, U of T Mississauga, joined by the City of Mississauga, announced the launch of SpinUp – U of T’s first wet lab venture incubator with the objective of supporting early-stage life science companies and entrepreneurs.

U of T Mississauga Vice-President and Principal Alexandra Gillespie made the announcement at the BIO 2023 convention in Boston, alongside Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie, Life Science Ontario President and CEO Jason Field and U of T Mississauga Vice-Principal Research Kent Moore.

“SpinUp will invite entrepreneurs into U of T Mississauga's New Science Building, which will open in 2023 as one of the most comprehensive and energy-efficient laboratory facilities in North America,” Moore said.

“At SpinUp, entrepreneurs can use this facility for a fraction of the cost of comparable spaces, gaining time and conserving capital to build their companies even before they have to seek major private investment.”

The incubator will offer affordable access to the specialized lab space, equipment and programming that emerging entrepreneurs need to mature their lab-based innovations. By addressing two major barriers – access to lab space and cost – U of T will offer a comprehensive set of resources for life science entrepreneurs and start-ups. It will also enrich U of T Mississauga's programs by creating new experiential learning opportunities and fostering research partnerships.

Most of the wet lab will be offered to ventures emerging from U of T’s accelerator programs, while a subset of spots will be available to those off-campus from within the region.

An illustration of the SpinUp lab space in the New Science Building, currently under construction

With any life sciences innovation or company, access to wet lab space and equipment is a critical step in maturing intellectual property and expanding a start-up. With SpinUp, U of T aims to keep new start-ups within the local ecosystem to avoid companies moving outside the region – or even failing before having a chance to begin.

“U of T Mississauga drives life science innovation,” Gillespie said. “Leading researchers, students and partners come together here to launch start-ups that promote health, prosperity and vitality in our communities and around the world.”

U of T ranks No. 1 in Canada for research-based start-ups and is in the top five for university-managed incubators globally. This focus on developing entrepreneurship and innovation has launched more than 600 companies over the past 10 years, leading to more than 9,000 jobs.

In recent years, U of T has been ranked second among North American universities for number of startups, after MIT. SpinUp will serve as a key resource for ventures emerging from the university and elevates U of T’s global position.

“SpinUp is a much-needed and welcomed addition to IDEA – Mississauga’s Innovation District – and we are thrilled that UTM’s new incubation space will be opening soon,” Crombie said.

“Our goal is to work with partners in the community, like U of T Mississauga, to provide resources and facilities to support businesses from early stages of inception to scale-up, until they ultimately transition into their own space with a sustainable path forward. SpinUp will be a key element in this journey for smaller life sciences companies and advances our city’s position as a leader in this space."

SpinUp will be part of the New Science Building, which is also the future home of the Centre for Medicinal Chemistry, UTM’s first-in-Canada program in forensic science and leading-edge research labs working to improve human health.

U of T Engineering outreach program helps Black high school students access STEM programs

geoff.vendeville — Mon, 23 Aug 2021 18:50:45 +0000

U of T Engineering outreach program helps Black high school students access STEM programs

geoff.vendeville Mon, 08/23/2021 - 14:50

Cutline

Stephen Laditi and Favour Nwanna, who are beginning their undergraduate studies at U of T Engineering this fall, are both graduates of a STEM-focused program called Blueprint (photos submitted)

Tyler Irving

Topic

Our Community

Diversity and Inclusion

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Life Sciences

STEM

Undergraduate Students

For Stephen Laditi, engineering is all about change.

“The jobs that engineers do are always for the betterment of society,” says the first-year civil and mineral engineering student in the University of Toronto's Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering. “Whether it’s about making roads safer or designing sustainable buildings, engineering touches almost everything around us.

“This is something that I want to be part of.”

Despite Laditi’s certainty about what he wanted to do, as a Grade 11 student he was a little less sure about how to make it happen.

That’s where Blueprint came in. The U of T Engineering program, which launched last summer, engages Black students in Grade 9 to 11 who have a love of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).

“Blueprint let me see what the engineering world would look like, through projects such as programming robots and optimizing a gardening space,” Laditi says. “But on top of that, it helped me show the admissions evaluators that I know how to work collaboratively to solve problems, which is a vital skill both in university and in any engineering workplace.”

“There is a real need in this country to ensure that Black high school students know that they are not only welcome, but wanted and needed – at universities, and in engineering in particular,” says Dawn Britton, associate director of engineering outreach at U of T Engineering.

“For too many years we’ve watched the number of Black students entering STEM studies stay at very low numbers,” she says. “Blueprint was developed to specifically and intentionally work to change that.”

Engineering Outreach Coordinator Cassandra Abraham was one of Blueprint’s key architects. She says it was clear from the beginning of the program that it would extend beyond the end of the summer and continue offering mentorship to participants throughout the school year, particularly those in their last year of high school.

“In one of our sessions, we asked students if they felt like they were getting the support they needed to successfully complete their university applications,” she says. “Most said they were not, so we created My Academic Planning Sessions, or MAPS.”

The sessions helped students write a statement of interest, build a resume and obtain recommendation letters, as well as identify their personal learning styles. Blueprint students met with current engineering undergraduates, recruitment officers and learning strategists to develop successful university applications.

This fall, five graduates of the inaugural Blueprint program are beginning undergraduate studies at U of T – four in engineering and one in life sciences.

Laditi is among them, as is Favour Nwanna, who is entering TrackOne, a general first-year program that leads to a bachelor’s degree in one of eight engineering disciplines.

“Blueprint played a huge role in my being accepted into U of T Engineering,” Nwanna says. “I met with other students currently enrolled in engineering programs who could provide advice, and I got my questions answered by the people involved in the admissions process. It really helped me be mentally prepared for what was to come.”

Nwanna says she’s currently most interested in computer engineering, with an eye to a possible career in the tech industry – but she’s keeping her options open.

“Before Blueprint, I had a stereotypical view of what engineers were and what they do,” she says. “This program helped open my eyes to the many sectors of engineering. I think that TrackOne will allow me to explore many fields while developing a solid foundation, so that I will be able to make a well-informed decision once the time comes.”

In addition to those accepted to U of T, many other Blueprint participants have joined STEM programs at other institutions. Others have gotten their first jobs as a result of the program’s job-preparedness and resume-building workshops.

This summer, Blueprint received more than 190 applications from high-achieving Black students from across Canada – more than double last year’s total.

“I know that this is just the beginning, and I hope that this number grows every year,” Abraham says. “My wish is that these students, after their first year, become mentors for our Blueprint program. There’s a whole network of Black people behind the scenes, making sure that we try to touch every Black student interested in STEM.”

Outside of U of T, Abraham is a member of Black Youth in Technology, Engineering and Science (BYTES), a network of organizations supporting Black youth in STEM in Toronto and other municipalities.

“We all can do our part to make sure that Black students are being reached,” she says. “My most memorable moment is when a parent called my cell phone to personally thank me for the work I was doing. After that call, I was flooded with tears because of her kind words and encouragement. I realized that we had created a space where students felt truly supported and loved.”

For Laditi, what matters most is the coming semester. He is excited about the return to in-person learning, and the new connections he will be able to form.

“Being here at U of T Engineering will open many doors for me, enabling me to choose my own path,” he says. “My current plan for after graduation is to either pursue a master’s degree or start my own civil engineering firm. But, in all honesty, I can see this degree taking me anywhere I want to go.”

U of T engineering and life sciences students to test how changes in gravity affect human genetics

geoff.vendeville — Wed, 18 Aug 2021 17:12:39 +0000

U of T engineering and life sciences students to test how changes in gravity affect human genetics

geoff.vendeville Wed, 08/18/2021 - 13:12

Cutline

Astronaut David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency takes pictures of the Earth below from inside the International Space Station's "window to the world," the seven-windowed cupola (photo courtesy NASA)

Christina Heidorn

Topic

Breaking Research

Institute of Biomedical Engineering

Aerospace

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Life Sciences

Undergraduate Students

A team of University of Toronto students is preparing to see its research take off next week.

They are among just six university teams from across Canada selected to conduct a study in a microgravity environment aboard the National Research Council Canada’s (NRC) Falcon 20 jet – the same plane used to train the Canadian Space Agency’s astronauts.

As part of the Canadian Reduced Gravity Experiment Design Challenge (CAN-RGX), the team – called TelOmG – has spent the past year designing and building a unique experiment to examine the impact of space flight on astronauts’ genes.

The members of team TelOmG, from left to right, are Erin Richardson, Anthony Piro, Miranda Badovinac in the top row; Taylor Peters, Dunja Matic, Luca Castelletto in the middle row; Samantha Aberdein, Emma Belhadfa, Nicole Richardson, Krish Joshi, and MacKenzie Campbell in the bottom row (photos courtesy of team TelOmG)

During the flight, scheduled for Aug. 19, the students will investigate the effects of changes in gravity on the genetic regulation of human telomeres. Telomeres are protective caps at the ends of our chromosomes that are linked to genomic stability. Shortening of telomeres is associated with aging, while lengthening can be associated with cancer.

The idea for the experiment came to team lead Erin Richardson, a fourth-year student in engineering science in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, while reading NASA’s landmark Twins Study, an investigation of spaceflight’s effects on the human body. The study focused on American astronaut Scott Kelly, who spent nearly a year in space, and his twin brother Mark who remained earthbound, and found Scott’s telomeres unexpectedly grew longer during his space flight. They returned to normal shortly after his return to Earth. In contrast, his twin’s telomeres remained stable during the same period.

“Our experiment investigates whether this increase in telomere length was due to reduced gravity or some other factor, such as increased radiation or stress during the space flight,” says Richardson.

Flying parabolic manoeuvres on the NRC’s Falcon 20 will allow the team to isolate microgravity from the other factors present on the International Space Station. However, while Kelly spent months in space, the experiment will only undergo five, 20-second periods of microgravity.

The students had to devise a way to test whether telomeres are affected by microgravity in under 20 seconds. “Telomere length won’t change that fast,” says Richardson. “The key was to focus on the transcription of the genes that control them. Previous studies found transcriptomes changed significantly within 20 seconds of altered gravity.”

Richardson recruited other students from engineering science's aerospace and biomedical systems majors as well as from the life sciences. In addition to Piro, the team includes: MacKenzie Campbell, a graduate of engineering science and master's student in chemical engineering; Dunja Matic and Taylor Peters, both in their fourth year of engineering science; Emma Belhadfa and Luca Castelletto in year three of engineering science; year three life science student, Miranda Badovinac; and Grade 12 students Samantha Aberdein, Krish Joshi, and Nicole Richardson.

The aerospace engineering team members focused on designing and building the physical apparatus, while biomedical systems and life science students designed and tested the experiment’s scientific methods.

“One of the beautiful things that happens when you bring together people with so many different backgrounds, is the ingenuity in the questions they ask each other,” says Rodrigo Fernandez-Gonzalez, an associate professor at the Institute of Biomedical Engineering and chair of engineering science's biomedical systems major. “Those questions often challenge dogmas and assumptions and can ultimately lead to amazing discoveries.”

To test their hypothesis that microgravity contributes to changes in gene transcription related to telomeres, the students will “freeze cells in time” by preserving their nucleic acids before and after each short period of microgravity. They will analyze the nucleic acids after the flight for changes in the expression levels of genes that regulate telomeres.

The experiment’s apparatus consists of a syringe filled with a stabilization solution and connected to a series of chambers containing live cells. The electronic control system will inject the solution into the correct chamber when manually triggered by the students on board the flight just before and after each period of microgravity. Some samples are frozen before any periods of hypergravity or microgravity to control for environmental conditions on board the jet.

The TelOmG injection system (graphic courtesy of team TelOmG)

The entire experiment had to fit into a 50-centimetre cube and weigh no more than 45 kilograms, among other constraints. “Little things that you wouldn’t normally consider are much more challenging in microgravity,” says Castello, the team’s mechanical lead.

“For example, we had to ensure everything is absolutely leak-proof and secured so that there’s no chance of small components or liquid floating around the plane’s cabin. Since we are dealing with cells, we had to create a sterile system while also minimizing bubbles that could interfere with our fluid pathways.”

Team TelOmG presented their proposal at the Johnson Space Centre Astronomical Society in June and has been invited to share their findings at the International Astronautical Congress in Dubai in October.

Conducting research during a pandemic presented additional challenges. Access to wet labs and lab safety training was restricted. “We’ve been blown away by the support we received from professors, researchers and private companies during this time,” Belhadfa says. “They helped us to get what we needed when public health restrictions created obstacles.”

Team members also had to work on components in isolation for many months. “Normally when we work in a team and something goes wrong during equipment testing, we have a good laugh together,” Castelletto says. “It’s a lot less funny when you’re all alone in your house.”

Planning and testing a complex experiment from start to finish has been an eye-opening journey for the team. “From our experiences in design courses like Praxis, we knew to expect things not to go as planned,” Campbell says. “We really learned to take a wide view of the project and lean on our project management skills.”

Tracing the steps of nearly 10,000 U of T PhDs after graduation

geoff.vendeville — Thu, 01 Feb 2018 05:00:00 +0000

Tracing the steps of nearly 10,000 U of T PhDs after graduation

geoff.vendeville Thu, 02/01/2018 - 00:00

Cutline

PhD students at a convocation ceremony in June 2014 (photo by Johnny Guatto)

Geoffrey Vendeville

Topic

City & Culture

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Rotman School of Management

School of Graduate Studies

Social Sciences

Subheadline

“What we see in the results is the wide variety of job options”

Where do I go from here? It's a question all students ask themselves approaching graduation, and one that is particularly important for students who have devoted five or six years to a PhD.

The answer, it turns out, is anywhere.

In a first-ever survey of PhD graduates from the University of Toronto, the School of Graduate Studies found that alumni who graduated between 2000 and 2015 are working in 97 different countries, with careers ranging from neurosurgeon to user-experience researcher.

About 60 per cent of graduates across all disciplines found work in academia, and roughly a third hold tenure-stream positions. However, the data suggest PhD graduates are increasingly ending up outside the academy. Comparing the cohorts of 2015 to 2000, nearly twice the proportion of PhDs were employed in the private sector (23 per cent as opposed to 13 per cent).

“Partly what we see in the results is the wide variety of job options that PhD students' futures might hold,” says SGS Dean Joshua Barker. “It's really the beginning of a conversation that I think will be very helpful for students as they think about the pathways from their studies into their careers.”

Take a closer look at the data on the SGS website

Employment sectors of all PhDs in the survey by division between 2000 and 2015 (courtesy of the School of Graduate Studies)

The project was initiated by Professor Reinhart Reithmeier, with support from former Dean Locke Rowe. Researchers compiled the data using internet searches of open-access data sources, such as official university and company websites, to determine a PhD’s current employment. They found the professional outcomes of nearly 10,000 former students, or 88 per cent of graduates, over the 15 years covered by the study. With the help of U of T’s Institutional Data Hub, SGS then created an interactive dashboard that allows users to customize their exploration of the data.

Read about the survey in the Globe and Mail

The list of current private-sector employers reads like a who's who of top companies: Google, Intel, Janssen, RBC and Scotiabank figure in the top five. PhD graduates in the post-secondary sector can be found everywhere from Canadian universities to the National University of Singapore. In the public sector, the top employers included the University Health Network, the Hospital for Sick Children and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health.

Barker, whose own PhD focused on Indonesia during the dictatorship of the 1990s, says U of T graduates with advanced degrees are well positioned to find jobs in new and interesting fields. “Toronto is emerging as one of the hubs of the knowledge economy, and the specialized training PhDs acquire can play a big part in elevating and expanding innovation locally and globally,” he says.

The data show how U of T contributes to a “brain gain” in Canada, with nearly half (46 per cent) of permanent residents and international students finding employment here.

The study is not the only good news U of T has received about the future prospects of its graduates. Over the past several years, the university has consistently led other Canadian institutions in Times Higher Education's global university employability rankings.

Like any study, the SGS survey has its limitations, Barker says. “This study tells us where our recent cohorts of our PhDs have landed, but further research will be needed to understand the pathway that led them there, or how they feel about that pathway.”

U of T News went beyond the numbers by speaking to four PhD graduates and one current student, Hadiya Roderique, about their time here, why they pursued a PhD and how it has prepared them for the future.

Inmar Givoni

Machine learning (2005-2011)

The similarities between the human brain and artificial intelligence are often overstated, Givoni says. But in her case, an early fascination with neuroscience preceded her interest in machine learning.

In high school, she became interested in one of the body's great mysteries: brain functioning. She grew up aspiring to become a neuroscientist, and spent a summer in a lab studying the rat's visual cortex.

She changed her mind after taking a course in machine learning at Hebrew University and switched her focus to artificial intelligence. “I thought, 'OK, I still want to do research, but instead of trying to understand the brain, maybe I can focus on trying to create machines and build algorithms that mimic what the brain does.'”

That goal led her to U of T, a world leader in the field. She was paired with her adviser Professor Brendan Frey, the founder and CEO of startup Deep Genomics, which uses machine learning to develop genetic medicines.

She graduated in 2011 and now applies her research to her work as an autonomy engineering manager at Uber in Toronto. Over and above technical skills, she says she learned to be her own boss.

“You're not doing [the work] because someone is telling you to do it,” she says. “You really have to have the motivation within yourself.”

Helen Marshall

Medieval and Renaissance studies (2008-2013)

Marshall says she wouldn't be the writer she is today if she hadn't pored over medieval manuscripts in university.

She's the author of two short story collections and two poetry collections, and a senior lecturer of creative writing and publishing at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge, England,

Her first book of short stories, Hair Side, Flesh Side, takes its title from the animal skins used for parchment. The collection includes Blessed, the story of a seven-year-old girl, Chloe, whose divorced parents give her the bodies of saints in an eerie game of one-upmanship. It starts when Chloe receives the body of St. Lucia of Syracuse as a birthday present from her dad. “It was rough like a cat's tongue in some places and smooth as fine-grained wood in others where the bone peeked through,” Marshall writes. Not to be outdone, Chloe's mom later gives her the body of Joan of Arc.

Marshall told U of T News she was inspired by a chapter she was writing on medieval saints' lives and how their bodies “had become this odd sort of tourist industry.”

“There was something about taking holy bodies and doing something really mundane and commercial around them,” she says. “It seemed funny to me – an odd paradox of the Middle Ages to play with.”

At U of T, she was part of a writers' group with students in medieval studies and literature – including Kari Maaren, who published her first novel last year.

When she started her PhD, Marshall thought getting her doctorate would mean becoming an expert in one field. “Since then what's surprised me the most is to realize that actually I learned a set of skills that means I can become the expert of any field I want to – because it's about learning the processes of research and critical thinking.”

Emma Planinc

Political science (2011-2017)

There was never any doubt in Planinc's mind: She wanted to be a professor. After studying literature and philosophy at U of T as an undergrad and then taking a master's in political science at McGill University, she returned to Toronto for a PhD in political science.

“Devoting six years of my life to the PhD always felt like a cost I was willing to bear because I thought I couldn't be doing anything else,” she says.

“There is a big transformative moment when you're doing your PhD,” she added, which begins with writing your thesis proposal. The degree gave her the time and freedom to think deeply about the subjects that interest her, including 18th-century French philosophy and natural science. Her dissertation is the basis of her in-progress first book, Regenerating Political Animals, which situates the “Declaration of The Rights of Man and of the Citizen” from the French Revolution within the context of contemporary science, theology and philosophy.

In a way, she's come full circle to her interests in literature and philosophy, having recently accepted a tenure-track position as an assistant professor at the University of Notre Dame in the liberal studies program. In addition to political theory, she will be teaching canonical books like The Odyssey. She starts her new job this fall.

Michael Selvanayagam

Electrical and computer engineering (2010-2014)

Selvanayagam spent part of his PhD working on an idea that sounds straight from science fiction: an invisibility cloak.

He and his supervisor, electromagnetics Professor George Eleftheriades (above, right) in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, developed a device that can hide a metal cylinder from radar detection, or make the cylinder appear smaller, bigger or plastic.

Hadiya Roderique

Organizational behaviour and human resource management (2012-present)

Roderique, a U of T law graduate, is now pursuing a PhD at U of T. She was one of only five Black lawyers at a prestigious Bay Street law firm. Her time working in law, which she describes in a widely read Globe and Mail piece, left her feeling like she didn’t belong.

Questions that arose from that experience led her to quit her job and pursue a PhD at the Rotman School of Management.

Her thesis deals with parenthood. “I'm particularly interested in social relationships in the workplace,” she says. “We've observed gender differences in these social relationships, but we also have research that shows mothers are uniquely penalized in the workplace.”

She expects to defend her thesis this summer and has already lined up interviews with top consulting companies.

She thinks it’s unlikely she will end up in academia. “I see my role as a translator, someone who can make sense of the very important research people are doing and communicate that to the world, whether through journalism, consulting or policy development.”

U of T study on redback spiders finds seemingly abhorrent mating strategy appears to benefit both males and females

rasbachn — Tue, 12 Dec 2017 15:57:04 +0000

U of T study on redback spiders finds seemingly abhorrent mating strategy appears to benefit both males and females

rasbachn Tue, 12/12/2017 - 10:57

Cutline

(photo by Ken Jones)

Topic

Breaking Research

Life Sciences

Maydianne Andrade

Research & Innovation

Spiders

U of T Scarborough

A mating strategy among redback spiders where males seek out immature females appears to benefit both sexes, a new University of Toronto study has found.

“There’s no evidence to suggest this behaviour is costly to females in terms of survivorship and reproductive output,” says Luciana Baruffaldi, post-doctoral researcher and director of the Andrade lab at U of T Scarborough and lead author of the research published in the journal Scientific Reports.

The research builds on past work by the Andrade lab that found some male redback spiders will avoid being cannibalized by mating with immature females that are not experienced in eating their partners. For this study, they wanted to determine whether males mating with immature females was a sign of “coercion” – a male mating tactic that was costly to females.

At least superficially, the behaviour appeared to be against the female’s best interest. For one, males in this case mate with little investment in courtship, mating will sometimes injure females, while females will often attack potential mates, suggesting resistance.

But what they found was that being mated as an immature has no cost to females in terms of reproductive output or survival, and that females mating in this way do not signal for additional mates in the future.

“This early mating may be good for female redback spiders because in nature they’re at risk of not finding a mate at all,” says Baruffaldi.

Luciana Baruffaldi, director of the Andrade lab at U of T Scarborough and lead author of the research published in Scientific Reports (photo by Ken Jones)

Any delays in mating are costly for female redbacks. Not only do they lose out on potential offspring, past research has shown that unmated females have shorter lifespans than mated females, likely the result of having eggs that have to be maintained that can be a drain on their resources.

Redbacks, a species of venomous widow spiders, are one of few arachnids that engage in sexual cannibalism while mating. In fact, males have been observed to actively assist in being cannibalized by doing summersaults to place their abdomen over the adult female’s mouth. In the majority of cases, females will continue to eat the male even while they mate. But this seemingly extreme form of mating also appears to have advantages in terms of reproductive success.

Interested in publicly funded research in Canada? Learn more at U of T’s #supportthereport advocacy campaign

Professor Maydianne Andrade, co-author of the research and Baruffaldi’s thesis supervisor, says the behaviour needs to be considered in terms of its evolutionary consequences.

“When you study evolutionary ecology, there’s a temptation to ascribe human characteristics or judgments on the behaviour being observed,” says Andrade, a world-renowned expert on the mating habits of cannibalistic spiders.

“What we’re seeing could have more than one evolutionary implication, and even if it looks abhorrent to us, the evolutionary consequence can be positive for the animal engaging in that behaviour.”

Andrade says if we want to think about why a particular set of behaviours has evolved, the underlying question is how it may affect the reproductive success of the animal doing it.

“That’s the evolutionary currency – what’s playing out over time is the number of gene copies left behind in offspring,” she says.

Read the fully study in the journal Scientific Reports

“If there’s a behaviour that increases how many gene copies are left, this means more offspring showing the same traits as their parents, and that’s the behaviour we expect to see.”

The study received funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (CFI), and the Canada Research Chairs Program.

U of T 13th in the world in psychology, excels in health and life sciences: THE rankings

geoff.vendeville — Wed, 08 Nov 2017 05:00:00 +0000

U of T 13th in the world in psychology, excels in health and life sciences: THE rankings

geoff.vendeville Wed, 11/08/2017 - 00:00

Cutline

(photo by Laura Pedersen)

Geoffrey Vendeville

Topic

Global Lens

Computer Science

Faculty of Arts & Science

International Rankings

Life Sciences

Psychology

Times Higher Education

The University of Toronto ranks 13th in the world for psychology – in the company of elite American and British universities – in the Times Higher Education’s latest university rankings by subject.

Times Higher Education (THE) ranks universities in 11 subject areas, but the company is only releasing a few subject results at a time. Rankings for psychology, life sciences, and clinical health were released today.

In psychology, U of T ranked ahead of Columbia University and New York University but three spots below the University of British Columbia – the other Canadian institution in the top 20. Stanford University took the top spot. In comparison to other public universities, U of T's results are even more impressive: The university placed 7^th in psychology worldwide.

In the life sciences category, which covers agriculture, forestry, biological sciences, veterinary science and sport science, the university held steady at 22 – although the number of schools ranked by THE this year grew to 500 from 100. U of T is in the top 10 in this category when excluding private universities.

And in “clinical, pre-clinical and health,” which includes medicine and dentistry, U of T was once again the only Canadian university among the top 20, along with top international universities like Oxford, Cambridge and Harvard. U of T was 19^th, down five spots since the rankings were expanded.

Nicholas Rule, acting chair of the psychology department in the Faculty of Arts & Science, wasn't surprised to see U of T recognized as a world leader in the field, based on quality of teaching, research and other criteria across many departments. Psychology encompasses a range of sub-specialties, including educational, sport and clinical psychology.

“U of T was the capital on the map for decades in terms of understanding human memory – and that’s still an area where we have tremendous strengths,” he says.

In his undergraduate studies in the U.S., Rule was introduced to the ideas of University Professor Emeritus Fergus Craik and Professor Emeritus Endel Tulving, who did seminal work on different types of memory, including episodic memory (remembering particular events) and semantic memory (remembering generally what things are or do).

Their work is so fundamental “that we almost take it for granted now because it’s so basic to what’s developed since,” Rule says.

In recent years, the department has built on its strengths and expanded into computational cognitive neuroscience – applying mathematical models to understanding how the brain works, especially in perception and memory.

At Amy Finn's lab in Sidney Smith Hall, researchers look at how brain development affects learning.

“Brain structures don't develop at the same rate, with some developing earlier than others,” explains Finn, an assistant professor in the department of psychology. “The two neural systems that I focus heavily on underlie what we call procedural memory (or implicit memory, “knowing how”) and declarative memory (explicit or verbalizable memory “knowing what”),” she says. “The procedural form appears to mature earlier.

“Current studies are looking at what this means for the ways in which children learn all kinds of information differently.”

Some of her research may help answer the perplexing question: Why do children have an easier time than adults learning a new language? In one study, she and her co-authors found that the harder adults tried to learn an artificial language, the worse they were at understanding its structure. She suggests that adults' more developed cognitive skills may actually impede learning language, especially when it comes to picking up on nuances and exceptions.

See more ranking stories

Tahmid Khan, University of Toronto student, is still detained in Bangladesh

lanthierj — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 14:05:21 +0000

Tahmid Khan, University of Toronto student, is still detained in Bangladesh lanthierj Wed, 08/10/2016 - 10:05

Cutline

(Khan, in an undated Facebook photo from 2015)

Topic

The University of Toronto is continuing to monitor the case of student Tahmid Khan, one of two men held by authorities in Bangladesh following last month’s hostage taking at a restaurant in Dhaka.

The life sciences student, who is set to enter his fourth year of studies at U of T, was in Dhaka visiting family and was in the restaurant on July 1 during the terrorist attack that left 20 dead. In the days following the incident, he and one other hostage were detained by police and his family and friends have appealed for help amid conflicting reports about his whereabouts. Human Rights Watch also has appealed for news on the condition and treatment of the two men.

After weeks of Khan’s family pressing for information, reports surfaced last week that a court had granted police eight days to question Khan and the other man who was detained, British national Hasnat Karim.

University of Toronto President Meric Gertler last month wrote a letter to Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion expressing concern for the student’s welfare and confirming that he is a student in good standing who is an active member of the university community.

The university is continuing to watch the case.

“We’re concerned about the well-being of Tahmid,” U of T spokesperson Althea Blackburn-Evans said. “We have students coming to us from all over the world so when something like this happens our first thought is for the well-being of the student and wanting to ensure the student is treated fairly.”

Khan is a permanent resident in Canada and not a Canadian citizen and officials have said that this limits the role Global Affairs Canada can play.

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Tahmid Khan, University of Toronto student, is still detained in Bangladesh