Professor of Medicine, Director, Leadership Sinai Centre for Diabetes. University of Toronto Dr. Bernard Zimnan is one of Canada's most distinguished clinician-scientists with exceptional achievements in Diabetes research and care. He has excelled as a physician researcher, educator, mentor and academic citizen. His most significant enduring initiative was his role in the NIH-directed Diabetes Control and Complications Trial (DCCT) and related follow-up studies, which established the importance of glycemic control in the preventing the complications of Type 1 Diabetes. As a translational ...

Professor Emeritus, University of Alberta

Kue Young has played a pivotal role in the development of Aboriginal and northern health research in Canada and internationally. He was one of the first researchers in Canada to recognize the emerging diabetes epidemic among First Nations in the early 1980’s. He has contributed substantially to understanding the epidemiology and genetics of diabetes in that population, and its prevention and control. A population health research scientist of the first order, he received the CIHR Senior Investigator award 1998-2008. Dr. Young has authored six books on Aboriginal and circumpolar health, and a ...

Professor, McGill University

Dr. Jacquetta Trasler is internationally recognized for her research in the field of reproductive and developmental epigenomics and its impact on the normal development of children. Her epigenetic studies stand out in considering sex-specific effects along with the impact of both fathers’ and mothers’ exposures to environmental stressors in predisposing their children to adverse health outcomes. Her fundamental studies identified sex-specific windows of epigenetic susceptibility and mechanistic insights into epigenetic inheritance. Her translational studies on the adverse epigenetic and child ...

Dr. Kevin Schwartzman is Director of the Respiratory Division at McGill University. He is Chair-Elect of the Tuberculosis Section of the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease. He is a clinician investigator and awardwinning educator (Canadian Association for Medical Education). His research assesses the impact and costeffectiveness of public health programs combating and preventing tuberculosis, in Canada and abroad.

Lawrence Rosenberg is currently the A.G. Thompson Chair of Surgical Research at the McGill University Health Centre. His current studies address islet cell neogenesis, pancreatic stem cells, and islet cell death and survival. Dr. Rosenberg was a founding member of the Stem Cell Network of Canada and is on the editorial board of Organogenesis. He is an author on more than 160 peerreviewed publications. Dr. Rosenberg has received many career awards and fellowships, including: a Medical Research Council of Canada Fellowship, McLaughlin Foundation Fellowship, Medical Research Council of Canada ...

Director, Finestone Laboratory, McGill University

David Rosenblatt is Professor of Biology, Human Genetics, Medicine and Pediatrics, McGill University. He is a world authority in the area of inherited disorders of the vitamins folic acid and cobalamin (vitamin B12). His laboratory is the world reference centre for the diagnosis of these disorders and also has been responsible for the characterization of a number of these diseases and for the cloning of the responsible genes. This has allowed for proper diagnosis, carrier detection, and prenatal diagnosis. He also established the first Division of Medical Genetics in a Department of Medicine ...

Torsten Nielsen was inspired by Terry Fox to become a cancer researcher, training as a clinician-scientist in McGill’s MD/PhD program (and now directing that program at UBC). He works to translate new discoveries from emerging genomic technologies into practical diagnostics and treatments for cancer. His work has led to several new tests that allow accurate and inexpensive diagnosis of sarcomas, where he has also contributed to clinical trials leading to at least two new targeted sarcoma therapies. In breast cancer, Prof. Nielsen has developed tests currently in use internationally that ...

Professor Emeritus, Department of Family Practice, University of British Columbia

Louise Nasmith has been Principal of the College of Health Disciplines at the University of British Columbia since 2007. She was previously Chair of the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of Toronto from 2001-2007, and the Chair of the Department of Family Medicine at McGill from 1995-2002. Her scholarship has centred on medical education resulting in her obtaining a Master’s of Education from McGill in 1994 and a series of publications and presentations in this area. In addition she has been involved in a number of projects that focus on integration of care for ...

Dr. Steven Miller is Head and Professor of the UBC Department of Pediatrics and Chief of Pediatric Medicine at BC Children’s Hospital. He and his team’s brain-imaging studies of critically-ill newborns identified the power of early-life intensive care unit experience to shape the trajectory of brain development through childhood. His findings led a paradigm shift from brain injury as a fixedevent to a focus on “everyday” interventions that are modifiable to promote brain maturation. He is passionate about supporting the career development of early-career child health researchers and served as ...

Dr. Leiter is a Professor of Medicine and Nutritional Sciences at the University of Toronto and former Head of the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism at St. Michael's Hospital (2000-2010). His work on clinical trials on the prevention of atherosclerosis, especially in diabetes, has helped bring together the fields of diabetes and cardiology. He has played leadership roles within the scientific community and established new therapies to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease in diabetes and he has made major contributions to knowledge translation through both clinical practice ...