So... what have we accomplished?

Research is not a solo endeavour - no one ever works in a successful lab by themselves. I have been very fortunate to work with a team of very bright and creative people. Postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, research associates, technicians, undergraduate and summer students have all contributed to our research program in one way or another. Mostly it’s by doing the challenging experiments in the lab, but sometimes it’s through inspiration. Some of my best students were not brilliant scientists themselves, but were high-energy motivators of the rest of the team. Each member of my research team brings their own strengths to the table, and I value very much every member of my team and the work that they do. They challenge me and make me laugh, and there is nothing more delightful than having a student appear at my office door wearing a big grin. It is the euphoria that precedes the announcement of an experiment done well, or an unexpected but interesting result.

A young journalist recently interviewed me and asked the "dreaded question" - so what have you accomplished? He meant, I know, what have you done that helps women with ovarian cancer? This question is so hard to answer because the answer depends on the perspective. Since I started out life on a farm, I will use a farmer's analogy - you have to plow the field before you can plant the seeds. And what we have done for ovarian cancer in Canada is plow the field. In the past few years we have:
- trained students to become scientists with an interest in ovarian cancer, thereby building the number of ovarian cancer scientists in Canada from 3 to almost 30.
- established a national network of ovarian cancer tissue banks with the four primary sites in Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal and here in Ottawa. These tissues, donated by ovarian cancer patients at the time of their surgery, are tremendously important for scientists who want to study how these cancers form, how they progress, and how we can stop them from growing.
- built bridges between scientists and doctors so that what is discovered in the lab is immediately evaluated for its potential application in the clinic.
- identified proteins that are expressed in ovarian cancers and that make good targets for new drugs; and we have started to test some of those new drugs on women with ovarian cancer.
- worked with fund-raising organizations to devote funds to pilot projects on ovarian cancer with a special focus on those that have new ideas for identifying strategies for the prevention or early detection of ovarian cancer.
- generated the world's first and only transgenic animal model of ovarian cancer that is being used to study how the disease begins, how to detect it, how to prevent it or slow its progression, and how to treat it effectively.
- jumped all over new treatments, like oncolytic viruses, to test them in these models of ovarian cancer, to help pave the way for women with ovarian cancer to be eligible for the clinical trials of this new treatment when it becomes available.
In summary, we have plowed the field and we have planted many seeds. And not just one kind of seed. We have planted seeds for prevention, for early detection, for treatment, and for quality of life. And we are at the stage where we are nurturing our young plants, watching them carefully and hoping that at least one field will yield enough for a good harvest.

And, on that note of optimism, I wish you all happy holidays and a new year filled with laughter, chocolate and the thrill of discovery.