Martine Tétreault, researcher at the CHUM Research Centre (CRCHUM), has received funding for one of her projects to the tune of $5.7M from Genome Canada and Génome Québec through the Canadian Precision Health Initiative. The CHUM Foundation is providing an additional $2M of co-financing for this research project and the company Oxford Nanopore is supporting the project through in-kind contributions.

Working in collaboration with Dr. Ziv Gan-Or’s team (McGill University/The Neuro). Tétreault and her team are launching a large genetic sequencing project to better understand rare neurological diseases, linked to aging, affecting the Canadian population.

Including co-financing from the scientists at McGill University, the total amount allocated for this project is over $15.2M.

Better understanding neurological diseases

In Canada an estimated 10% of Canadians are affected by neurological diseases, particularly Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and epilepsy.

Even today there are significant gaps in our ability to identify the genetic factors that contribute to the development of these diseases, their progression and their responsiveness to treatments.

The current collection of genomics data is not sufficiently diversified, which limits the generalizability of research results, specifically for Indigenous communities and marginalized groups.

The NeuRo Genomics Initiative will allow Tétreault and Gan-Or’s teams to address these limitations by sequencing the genomes of 8,700 people, including patients with various neurological diseases, healthy individuals and people of diverse ethnicities.

Tétreault and the CHUM will make use of the well-established local biobank, SERVO, to sequence 2,700 patient samples.

Through the identification of genetic biomarkers and a better understanding of the genetic foundations of these diseases, this project is setting the tone for future research on personalized therapeutic treatments.