We are pleased to announce that Dr. Lucy Lee will be presenting as part of the Faculty of Science Dean’s Seminar Series. She has devoted 35 years to fish cell line development and in this presentation, she will recap her past work, present research projects and a fascinating future for fish invitromatics.
Fish invitromatics: a compilation of a research career
WHEN: Tuesday, February 20th
TIME: 1:30 – 2:30 PM
WHERE: B101, Abbotsford Campus
EVERYONE IS WELCOME TO ATTEND!
What is invitromatics?
Invitromatics is a new term introduced in 2017 to describe a field of research that dates back 75 years but had no distinct terminology. Since the early 1940’s, scientists have been able to culture and grow cells outside an organism and maintain them for seemingly indefinite times as “cell lines”. Most famous among the over 100,000 cell lines developed to date, is HeLa, the human cell line derived from a cervical cancer biopsy of an Afro-American woman in the early 1950’s. These cells were instrumental in the development of key vaccines and cancer medications, technologies for in vitro fertilization, gene mapping, cloning, among many other biotechnological applications. Although most cell lines available to date have been derived from humans, cell lines from many other organisms have been developed including fish.
Dr. Lucy Lee joined UFV in 2012 as the Dean of Science. Her second term will begin in September 2018 when she returns from Administrative/Sabattical leave. Her leave has been focusing on indigenization and internationalization of the sciences as well as advancing her research program.
Dr. Lee’s busy schedule has taken her to all parts of the globe. Since August 2017 she has visited the Faculty of Natural Resource Science at the University of Akureyri in Iceland; Skretting Aquaculture Research Centre in Stavanger, Norway; Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden; National Veterinary Institute at the Technical University of Denmark in Frederiiksberg; she gave a week long workshop to scientists from the Norwegian Veterinary Institute in Oslo, Norway; met with scientists at the University of Copenhagen; attended the National Diversity in STEM Conference (SACNAS) in Salt Lake City , Utah; gave a workshop to a Biotech Company in Berkeley, California; and has attended various innovation events in the Vancouver and Fraser Valley area. She’s been invited to Valdivia, Chile to give a two week graduate course in fish cell culture in March and has been invited to present in Indonesia in May and Switzerland in June 2018.
