Each year millions of animals are used in Canada for medical research and toxicity testing, but a growing body of scientific evidence points to the difficulties of treating humans like 70-kg mice.

After years of using rodents to conduct heart disease research, Charu Chandrasekera began to question the value of using animals as stand-ins for humans. She lost her fervour for animal research after her father suffered a heart attack, bringing home to her the realization that human relevance must be at the forefront of biomedical discoveries.

Dr. Chandrasekera’s quest to find more effective, human-centered research methods led her to develop the Canadian Centre for Alternatives to Animal Methods (CCAAM) at the University of Windsor, the first of its kind in the country.

“Despite decades of extensive research conducted at enormous expense, the rate of congruence between animal models and the human condition is at an all-time low,” says Chandrasekera, CCAAM’s inaugural executive director. “We do not fully understand human disease mechanisms and 95 per cent of drugs that test safe and effective in animals fail in human clinical trials.”

Given the tremendous differences in the way animals and humans regulate biological processes, CCAAM’s mandate is to use only human-based biomaterials and methods, with the goal of ultimately ending the use of experimental animals. From the Americas to the Far East, many countries boast alternatives centres — CCAAM will ensure that Canada is at the forefront of cutting-edge innovation in humane and human-centered research.

The initial focus will be on emerging methods using human-derived artificial organs, called organoids, and interconnected organoid models that mimic human physiology and allow the study of human-specific biological processes without the use of animals.

In conjunction with its research, Chris Houser, dean of science, plans to create undergraduate and graduate academic programs in animal replacement science.

“CCAAM is an amazing opportunity for the University of Windsor and is a watershed moment for health research in Canada,” Dr. Houser says. “The University of Windsor will be a leader in alternatives research and validation of non-animal methods, and the associated academic programs mean we will be training the next generation of scientists and health professionals in alternatives to animal methods.”

Through its subsidiary, the Canadian Centre for the Validation of Alternative Methods, CCAAM will work side-by-side with regulators, primarily Health Canada, and international consortia to expedite the development, validation, and acceptance of alternative toxicity testing methods in Canada.

With a multitude of already established connections, the centre’s mandate includes plans to expand and sustain local, national, and international partnerships with academic, industry, government, and public sectors.

“Given the diverse spectrum of alternatives research and the cultural change required to promote replacement, it is critical to build capacity and momentum through interdisciplinary, multi-centre, transformative partnerships extending beyond UWindsor premises,” Chandrasekera says.

“For spurring scientific progress, an interconnected community is key — CCAAM will be the hub that brings the academic, industry, government, and public sectors together to advance humane and human-centered science in Canada.”

In addition to Chandrasekera, the CCAAM leadership includes UWindsor biology professors Phillip Karpowicz as scientific director and Andrew Hubberstey as academic director. The centre will host an inaugural conference October 2 and 3.

K. W. Michael Siu, vice-president, research and innovation, says CCAAM is essential to the University of Windsor’s strategic research plan grand challenge to help build viable, healthy and safe communities.

“The University of Windsor has become a vehicle for the cross-transfer of knowledge, technology, and expertise, traversing exciting new terrain and opening new vistas,” says Dr. Siu. “CCAAM coincides with that vision and will place the University of Windsor at the cutting edge of human-centered research, and help building a viable, healthy and safe community.”

An important piece of Canadian history is now accessible to the public thanks to the launch of Breaking the Colour Barrier: Wilfred ‘Boomer’ Harding and the Chatham Coloured All-Stars (1932-1939) Project, which premiered at an open house in Chatham on Saturday. More than 350 community members attended.

The project, coordinated by UWindsor librarians Heidi Jacobs and Dave Johnstone, and history professor Miriam Wright, documents and celebrates the legacy of the Chatham Coloured All-Stars, the first black team to win an Ontario Baseball Association provincial championship in 1934.

The project is based on scrapbooks compiled by Boomer Harding’s daughter-in-law Pat Harding. Over the past two years, the researchers digitized these materials and oral histories with friends and family of the 1930s team. The website also contains a timeline documenting newspaper coverage of the 1934 season, educational resources based on the Ontario curriculum for Grades 1 to 12, and galleries of related images.

The research team also launched displays in the Chatham Sports Hall of Fame, a cartoon by Scott Chantler, and an eight-panel travelling exhibition. The project’s website is now live at cdigs.uwindsor.ca/BreakingColourBarrier/.

Dr. Wright says there is little written about Canadian black sports history, and outside of Chatham, few people know about Harding or the Chatham Coloured All-Stars. She says sports are a reflection of society and show the same struggles, conflicts and divisions found in daily life. Despite their athletic successes, Harding and his All-Stars teammates regularly faced discrimination both on and off the field.

“It’s important to acknowledge Harding’s story and that of the Chatham Coloured All Stars, because people often assume these types of racial barriers never existed in Canada,” Wright says.

The researchers partnered with the Chatham Sports Hall of Fame and used a $72,500 Ontario Trillium Foundation grant to develop the program and digitize fragile historical documents to make them accessible to future generations.

“This is a rare opportunity for local history enthusiasts, students, and seasoned researchers to learn about Boomer’s life, which is not just a story about sport, or race, but an intersectional narrative of human struggle and perseverance,” says Dr. Jacobs.

Early detection and treatment helped his father beat prostate cancer for 20 years, says physics lab co-ordinator Aldo DiCarlo.

Captain of the Ride for Dad, which led motorcyclists through a tour of Essex County on May 28 to raise awareness of the disease, he was on hand Tuesday to present a donation from the fundraising event to further biochemistry professor Siyaram Pandey’s research.

The donation totalled $42,433, which Dr. Pandey will use to fund the next stage of his studies, applying dandelion root extract — demonstrated to induce death in cancer cells — to prostate cancer.

“My father was part of the first human trials on dandelion root in Dr. Pandey’s lab,” DiCarlo said. “It is a real honour to be giving back to that research.”

Pandey said that advanced prostate cancer is difficult to treat.

“Chemotherapies are toxic and cause hair loss, vomiting, diarrhea, and a weakened immune system,” he said. “We will investigate the efficacy of dandelion root extract in selectively targeting human prostate cancer.”

If successful, the results could lead to clinical testing of treatments to aid patients.

Watch a video from the event:

See a day in the life of the Pandey lab from a student perspective.

Business student Elvis Duong won Tuesday’s DailyNews trivia quiz, demonstrating his knowledge of fathers fictional and metaphorical.

His entry was drawn from all those which correctly identified Spencer Tracy as the Father of the Bride, Joey Smallwood as the last Father of Confederation, Robert Young as the Father who Knows Best, Danny Thomas as the star of Make Room for Daddy, and Ed O’Neill as the sitcom patriarch of Married … With Children and Modern Family.

Duong will receive the donated prize, a toiletry kit, just in time for Father’s Day.

A year-long work experience with a company in Germany gave her the opportunity to put into practice what she learned at the Odette School of Business, says Micayla Pella.

A fourth-year B.Comm major specializing in strategy and entrepreneurship, she just returned from a co-op term at the Hanover headquarters of TÜV Nord. Pella worked in the firm’s business development department, considering its plans to operate in Canada.

“In the classroom, it’s all just theoretical, but my co-op position gave me a chance to apply that knowledge,” Pella says.

She worked with a team weighing the opportunities for a new venture in Canada, offering third-party vehicle inspections.

“It seems like there would be a market here for that service, for example, if you were deciding on a used car,” she says.

Pella discussed her co-op experiences as part of a series of poster presentations by business students who have completed their three co-op work terms, Tuesday in the Odette Building lobby.

The format helps students develop their skills, says Romina Oulevey, co-ordinator of co-op programs for Co-op, Career and Employment Services.

“This is a different style of presentation from what they’re used to in their courses,” she says. “The students benefit from learning new ways to communicate their messages.”

An additional session will feature presentations by seven students in the Odette lobby from 3 to 4 p.m. on Thursday, June 15.

Up to 80 experts in fluid dynamics from across Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and Iran will meet in Windsor to discuss the latest in research and advancements for the 25th Annual Conference of the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) Society of Canada. UWindsor plays host to the conference June 18 to 20.

“The applications of fluid dynamics are endless because you are talking about fluid flow in and around any space or object,” says Ronald Barron, mathematics professor and chair of the conference organizing committee.

Dr. Barron says understanding fluid dynamics is crucial to a broad spectrum of industries, including the aerospace and automotive industry, the nuclear and chemical industry, as well as in civil and environmental engineering. He says computational modelling is essential because lab experiments and full-scale testing are incredibly expensive compared to simulation models.

“From predicting lift forces on aircraft wings, which keep you up in the air, to determining how severely a river’s flow may degrade a pier or even how pollutants flow through the air and water, this can all done through computational modelling,” Barron says.

UWindsor previously hosted the CFD conference in 2002. The Computational Fluid Dynamics Society of Canada promotes computational fluid dynamics and provides a framework for communication and collaboration between researchers, software and code developers and practitioners in industry, government and academia.

“This year we have some great speakers who will focus on undergraduate CFD education challenges and opportunities, recent trends in automotive and civil engineering applications, as well as using gaming industry techniques to help accelerate our calculations using GPUs,” says Barron. “It is a great line-up. This is also a wonderful advertisement for a university of our size to not only host the conference, but to be hosting it for the second time.”

There are still spaces left to attend the conference, which will be held at the Ed Lumley Centre for Engineering Innovation, UWindsor’s CFD conference website contains all the contact information, including the list of plenary speakers. The Faculty of Science, Faculty of Engineering and the Office of the VP-Research are sponsoring the event.

In the eight years since the Annual Giving Program switched to a face-to-face model for soliciting support from UWindsor employees, it has found 378 new donors and raised about $2.4 million, president Alan Wildeman told a luncheon Tuesday for staff, faculty and retirees who contribute to the campus campaign.

“You’re having a huge impact,” Dr. Wildeman said.

Last year saw a record average gift of $540 for a total of almost $340,000.

Guest speaker Denny Young (BA 1977), co-ordinator of the Fundraising Management Ontario Graduate Certificate Program at Humber College, said his experiences as a student at the University of Windsor, helped to shape his approach to community.

“We all have something in our backgrounds that introduced us to the concept of philanthropy,” he said. “We have become so cynical about what people tell us; their actions speak much louder.”

Finance clerk Miguel Pebenito inherited his canvass from volunteer Janice Facecchia, who retired in December. The two combined for the highest participation rate, 82.4 per cent of employees in human resources and finance.

“I just followed Janice’s lead on this one,” Pebenito said. “I have a few ideas for next year so we can keep improving on our record.”

Athletics and Recreation Services boasted of a 100 per cent donation rate among its staff, topping the category for single departments. Both areas will enjoy a catered coffee break to celebrate their successes.

The luncheon marked a closure for Annual Giving Program co-ordinator Shae Harasym, who is taking up an appointment Thursday as major gift officer in the Faculty of Law.

Researchers Phil Graniero and Beverley Hamilton have been developing a suite of Excel-based tools which enable instructors to visualize, contextualize, and annotate their own student evaluation of teaching (SET) data. In the coming months, the research team will be facilitating usability testing and focus group sessions in which instructors will assess the tools’ design, usability, and stability.

Research suggests that SET data can be used for effective inquiry into student perceptions of the learning experience. The tools have been designed to enhance reflection, inquiry, and opportunities for instructors seeking to leverage data for reflective practice. They do not enable individual comparison among instructors.

If you are an instructor at the University of Windsor and you are interested in participating in this study, please contact research assistant Victoria Townsend at victoria.townsend@uwindsor.ca.

The study is supported by the University of Windsor Centred on Learning Innovation Fund (CLIF) and has been cleared by the university’s Research Ethics Board.

The CAW Student Centre is seeking sponsorships for an Iftar dinner on Tuesday, June 20.

Iftar is the evening meal that breaks the daily fast during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Tuesday’s student centre dinner is open to everyone.

Several campus offices will sponsor the June 20 event, including the Graduate Student Society, the Organization of Part-time University Students, the University of Windsor Students’ Alliance, the Campus Dental Centre, Campus Services, and the offices of the president, the provost, and Student Experience.

“It has been a pleasure to be a part of this initiative and supporting students for many years,” says Maryan Amalow, OPUS executive director. “We are always happy to support their basic needs.”

Additional contributors who confirm by June 15 may have their support acknowledged in promotional materials. For details, contact the organizers at msa@uwindsor.ca.

Annual preventative maintenance will require an outage of electrical and steam services to campus this weekend, reports Facility Services.

The electrical power outage will also disable card access and is scheduled for 12 hours, 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday, June 17. The following buildings will be inaccessible for this period: Leddy Library, CAW Student Centre, Music Building, Energy Conversion Centre and Dillon, Memorial, Assumption, Macdonald and Alumni halls. Find details in this document: Campus Wide Power Outage Information.

Information Technology Services recommends that occupants of the affected buildings shut down their office computers and photocopiers prior to leaving for the day on Friday.

The steam outage will also disable hot water and heating and cooling systems. It is scheduled to begin at noon Friday, June 16, and run through 10 p.m. Sunday, June 18. The shutdown will disrupt most campus buildings, with the exceptions of the LeBel Building, Centre for Automotive Research and Education, Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research, Centre for English Language Development, maintenance and grounds buildings. Find details in this document: Campus Wide Steam Outage Information.