Hometown: Vancouver, BC, Canada
Academic & professional history
Cathy (she/her) is currently a PhD candidate in the Genome Science and Technology program at UBC, and holds a Bachelors in Microbiology and Immunology.
What project(s) do you work on?
Cathy explores how single-cell sequencing technologies can improve precision cancer medicine. Precision medicine involves sequencing the DNA and RNA of patient tumours to reveal drivers of cancers that can be therapeutically targeted. Typically, clinical programs use bulk sequencing, which outputs signals that are averaged across the entire tissue sample. However, just as there are different types of cells in healthy tissue, tumours also contain distinct cell populations. Therefore, rare cell types relevant to cancer biology and treatment may be missed. Through integrated analyses of bulk genomes, and single-cell RNA-seq and ATAC-seq, Cathy hopes to explore and identify novel cancer vulnerabilities.
How do you spend your time outside of the lab?
Outside of research, Cathy likes to boulder and play violin.