David M Berman (Principal Investigator, and Professor of Pathology, Urology, and Oncology) gave up his role as a New York City bicycle maven to pursue MD and PhD degrees at U.T. Southwestern where he cloned the cDNA for the enzyme 5-alpha reductase and elucidated its role in prostate development. He then performed anatomic pathology and subspecialty training in urologic pathology at Johns Hopkins, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship in Molecular Biology and Genetics. He ran a research laboratory at Johns Hopkins University for 9 years prior to moving the Berman Lab to Queen’s University in Kingston Ontario where he now serves as Director of the Queen’s Cancer Research Institute. His research focuses on high impact biomarkers in prostate and bladder cancer. He performs diagnostic surgical pathology one week per month and devotes the rest of his professional efforts to research and administration. Outside work, David likes to travel, spend time with family, and obsess about coffee. You can find more about his random thoughts by following him on Twitter.
Hamid Ghaedi (Post-doctoral fellow) is a medical geneticist (PhD), specializing in bioinformatics from Iran. He joined Berman Lab in June 2020 and has been working on finding cancer subtype-specific biomarker for genitourinary cancers using tumor genomic data (transcriptome, methylome and variome) and machine learning techniques. Also Hamid is involved in a joint project with Dr Feilotter Lab, where he is working on integrating genomic data with clinical outcome data for patient with cancers(lung, colon and melanoma). Prior to joining the Queen’s University, he worked as an assistant professor at medical genetics department of SBMU (Tehran, Iran) form 2016-2020. During this time, he mentored master and Ph.D. students in both experimental and computational aspects of their research projects. From the clinical side, Hamid worked for genetic clinics (both private and public sectors) helping them with identifying disease-causing mutations in whole-exome sequencing data and providing post-test genetic counselling to patients and their families. In his free time, Hamid enjoys playing with his son, hiking, playing volleyball and, eFootball (PES!).
Minqi Xu (AP Resident) Minqi accomplished his medical school education at the Suzhou Medical College (Suzhou, Jiangsu, China) before moving to Winnipeg to pursue his research training in Oral Biology at the University of Manitoba and the National Research Council Institute for Biodiagnostics. In June 2018, Minqi and his family moved to Kingston from the prairies to begin Anatomical Pathology Residency training at Queen’s University. Minqi shows strong interest in Uropathology and joined Dr. Berman’s lab in July 2020 to enhance his residency research training with focus on urothelial carcinoma. Besides reading histology slides, he likes fresh water lake fishing.
Paola Nasute Fauerbach (PhD Candidate) earned her MD and board certification in Diagnostic Imaging from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. During her last year of residency, she rotated at the Jackson Memorial Hospital (USA) and was actively involved in clinical research for the development of zoledronic acid (a drug currently used for breast cancer metastases and other tumours). This sparked her interest in research and took her to Vancouver where she gained further training in chest imaging. While starting her family, she was actively involved in several chest research projects, the largest of which was the Pan-Canadian lung cancer screening study (funded by the Terry Fox Foundation and CIHR). This study’s results appeared in major journals such as the NEJM and The Lancet. At the same time, Paola was very fortunate to meet Dr. Linda Warren, the founder of the first organized screening mammography program in Canada and the USA. Under her supervision, she completed a 3-year clinical breast imaging fellowship at UBC. During that time, she got extensive training in all breast imaging modalities, including radiological-pathological rounds that led her to better understand the imaging findings based on the pathological features. As her 2 lovely children grew up and she found more time for her professional objectives, she decided to complete the last step of her academic career; to advance her knowledge of breast cancer, a disease that took away one of her most loved people, she chose to pursue a PhD degree. Having worked with images for years, she truly believes that a picture is worth 1,000 words! One of Paola’s hobbies is photography (naturally!) along with traveling, but what she treasures most is spending time with her loved ones, including her dog!
Robin Grainer is a mature Health Sciences student with a professional background ranging from midwife to stage hypnotist, patient advocate to taxidermist. It turns out that having numerous previous careers results in many useful skills, so Robin spends their time being a multipurpose lab tech, as comfortable sifting through medical charts as assessing histological specimens. Robin does not yet have a cancer speciality because they find everything interesting, but social inequity in cancer care is what they research most often. Fun-time activities include virtually attending medical conferences on random topics, teaching about taxidermy and dissection at educational workshops, taking singing lessons, growing fruit in their backyard, doing way too many kinds of crafts, and periodically supplying homemade goodies for Berman Lab’s staff. (Food is how Italians show caring!)
Raghavendra Tejo Karthik Poluri (PhD Candidate) I’m from Hyderabad, India. I’m incredibly judgemental when it comes to food and shoes. I’m a huge fan of Formula 1. So generally I’m pretty much busy on Saturdays and Sundays starting from mid-March to Dec watching live races (every year). Also, love to click pictures using my phone (mobile photographer). Coming to the other part. Did my MSc in Molecular Medicine at Université Laval where I majorly focussed on understanding the prostate cancer (PCa) cell metabolism. After spending two years in Quebec City, I’m not sure if I understood the PCa cell metabolism completely but definitely understood the art of making authentic Italian pizzas. In Aug 2020, Moved to Berman’s lab to pursue my PhD, where my work revolves around the identification of biomarkers for better diagnosis of PCa. I’m super interested in applying Machine learning and Artificial Intelligence techniques on biological data to understand and develop novel diagnostic methods or therapies to treat PCa.
Yuandong Xing (M.Sc. Candidate) comes from Xi’an, China and completed his bachelor’s degree in public health at Wuhan University, Wuhan, China. Yuandong previously engaged in researches regarding physical activities, lung cancer, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and ZIKA virus. He came to Canada for the first time as a MITACS intern in International Vaccine Center, University of Saskatchewan. After joining Berman’s lab in 2020, he sought to apply his knowledge regarding statistics to cancer research and to study bioinformatics in biomarkers identification. He was now interested in prostate cancer biomarkers. In his spare time, he enjoys singing songs, playing badminton and soccer and listening to talk shows.
Andrew Garven
is a Master of Science candidate with an Honour’s Bachelor in Health Sciences from McMaster University. Andrew’s work looks into the effect chromatin-modifying gene mutations on muscle invasive bladder cancer. Andrew’s research emerges from his background work on modelling biological molecules using deep learning. Broadly, Andrew is interested in exploring the usefulness of deep-learning and artificial intelligence in modernizing approaches to cancer research. Andrew is interested in pursuing work in the medical field at a future date. Nowadays, his free is spent outside enjoying his new home and his young puppy. On summer days, he’s wrangling fish or tossing his clubs on the golf course.
Ava Slotman is a Life Sciences Specialization student at Queen’s. She joined the Berman Lab as a volunteer during her second year and is currently completing an independent study project on nuclear morphometry in non-muscle invasive bladder cancer. Even after just one year in the lab, Ava has fallen in love with lab work and digital image analysis and is excited to keep expanding her project and research in the coming years. When not at Queens you can find Ava exploring locally on her bike, back in BC in the mountains, or overseas teaching English and setting up girls’ soccer teams in Colombia.
Jazlyn McGuinty is a first-year student in the Bachelor of Health Sciences program at Queen’s University. She is currently a part of the Berman Lab as a volunteer with a focus on investigating prognostic and predictive biomarkers in bladder cancers alongside some of the other lab members. As a curious frosh student and recent addition to the team, she is excited to contribute to these impactful patient-based research projects and perhaps begin her own independent study in the future. Jazlyn’s favourite activity is playing badminton both recreationally and competitively (there’s nothing like getting your stress out after a long day by smashing some birdies). When she’s not studying or playing badminton, she enjoys playing the piano, reading, and cooking – she can make anything from spicy guacamole to a mean Korean BBQ steak!
Benjamin Ravenscroft is currently an Applied Mathematics and Computing undergraduate student at Queen’s. He joined the Berman Lab in the summer before his third year and is currently assisting on a project deriving grading criteria for non-muscle invasive bladder cancer based on digital image analysis. Excited about a future in medicine and research, Ben is enthusiastic to work with and learn from the amazing researchers in the Berman Lab. Taking time off from competing as a varsity rower for Queen’s due to injury, he enjoys training in the hopes of becoming an Iron Man competitor, listening to too much music, and exploring and documenting the Rocky Mountains near his hometown of Calgary with friends.
Katie Lindale“Katie is pursuing a Master of Science in Translational Medicine following an Honour’s Bachelor degree in Neuroscience and Mental Health at Carleton University. She is fascinated by multidisciplinary, data-driven approaches to research and their translation to the optimization of patient care. Katie is excited to work on the spatial analysis of the tumour-immune microenvironment in Non-Muscle Invasive Bladder Cancer (NMIBC) in order to gain a deeper understanding of factors involved in treatment response. Outside of school, Katie loves to bike, read, explore the wilderness and experiment in the kitchen.”.
See diverse careers of former Berman Lab members here