Celebrating Achievements of Dr. Lee Adamson & MRC/CIHR Group in “Development and Fetal Health”
“Mysteries of Pregnancy Revealed with Animals Large and Small” took place at the University of Toronto's Faculty Club on October 17, 2014. With over 120 registrants, the program covered a wide range of topics - from pre-eclampsia to trophoblast stem cells - by great speakers including Drs. Steve Lye, Alan Bocking, John Challis, and Shannon Bainbridge. The Keynote Lecture was given by Dr. Jay Cross from the University of Calgary.
Since 1985, Dr. Adamson has been a prominent member of the scientific community in Toronto, becoming a Principal Investigator at the Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute and a Professor in the Departments of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, and Physiology at the University of Toronto, and a member of the Heart & Stroke Richard Lewar Centre of Excellence in Cardiovascular Research. Throughout her successful scientific career, Dr. Adamson has used animal models to advance our understanding of developmental cardiovascular physiology. Her long-term research goal has been to determine how the pathophysiology of fetal, placental, and maternal vascular systems contributes to life-threatening pregnancy complications including pre-eclampsia and fetal intrauterine growth restriction. This research was achieved with the help of 16 MSc and 6 PhD graduate students, 13 Fellows, 30 summer research undergraduate students, and the assistance of research collaborators and many excellent technicians. This research is described in over 117 peer-reviewed publications.
Dr. Adamson is the founding director of the Mouse Physiology Core of the Centre for Modeling Human Disease at the Toronto Centre for Phenogenomics as well as the founding Director of the BioBank Program of the Research Centre for Women’s and Infants’ Health at Mount Sinai Hospital. Both services are ongoing and are open to external users locally and internationally.
The Symposium is also a celebration of the MRC/CIHR Group in "Development and Fetal Health". The Group was founded in 1986 with a successful MRC Perinatology Development Grant led by Dr. Charlie Bryan with co-applicants Dr. Knox Ritchie and Dr. S. Lee Adamson. Dr. Adamson’s recruitment and the success of this application launched Mount Sinai Hospital’s Perinatology Research Division, which was established by Dr. Bryan at the invitation of the founding director of Mount Sinai’s Research Institute, Dr. Louis Siminovitch. A key element of the Development Grant was the establishment of the Perinatology Research Laboratory, which enabled research on pregnant sheep, the primary animal model for obstetrical and perinatal research at that time.
Dr. Stephen J. Lye was recruited as the new head of the Perinatology Research Division at Mount Sinai’s Research Institute in 1987. Under Dr. Lye’s leadership, the Group was enlarged and refunded in 1990 as a MRC Program Grant, and was enlarged once again when refunded in 1995 and 2000, as the MRC Group in Development and Fetal Health. In 2005, Dr. Adamson became the final Director of the group now named the CIHR Group in Development and Fetal Health, with the launching of the new CIHR. Shortly after this renewal was received, the Group Grant program was discontinued by CIHR. The group, which had grown to 10 investigators across the University of Toronto and affiliated Research Institutes, was ended in 2010 after almost 25 years of continuous funding and the establishment of one of the premier groups in Perinatal Research in Canada and internationally.
A total of 16 Principal Investigators were members of the Group over its 25 year legacy; Drs. Lee Adamson, Charles Bryan, Alan Bocking, Isabella Caniggia, Robert Casper, John Challis, Jay Cross, Andrea Juriscova, John Kingdom, Lowell Langille, Michelle Letarte, Stephen Lye, Neil Maclusky, Robert Morrow, Knox Ritchie, and Janet Rossant.