THE TECHNA INSTITUTE - Key Persons
Agata has been immersed in health informatics since her completing her undergrad at York University, where she graduated in 2015 with a Bachelor of Health Studies, specializing in Health Informatics. Following this, Agata completed her postgrad studies at McMaster University, graduating in 2018 with a Master of Science with a specialization in eHealth. Agata also has a deep interest in data analytics, which she pursued by obtaining a postgrad Certificate in Data Analytics, Big Data, and Predictive Analytics from Ryerson University.
Prior to her role at Techna, Agata spent two and a half years supporting clinical information system implementations as a Clinical Informatics Coordinator at St. Joseph's Health Centre in Toronto and Trillium Health Partners in Mississauga.
Job Titles:
- Assistant Professor - Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto
As a ubiquitous computing and human-computer interaction researcher, Alex Mariakakis' work broadly identifies applications of machine learning and computer vision on sensor data for human-centered issues. His primary research is in mobile health, leveraging smartphone sensors to objectively measure symptoms that are typically judged qualitatively. Alex's two most cited projects, PupilScreen and BiliScreen, leverage the smartphone camera to identify cases of an impaired pupillary light reflex (for traumatic brain injuries) and scleral jaundice (for pancreatic cancer). Alex's current research program seeks to combine passively collected sensor data with momentary assessments to support Bayesian diagnostics in contexts like influenza, Parkinson's disease, and mental health.
Alex is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Toronto. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington. Alex's work is published in top-tier venues in his field, including CHI and IMWUT. His work has also been featured by many media outlets (e.g., BBC, National Geographic, and USA Today). Alex is a recipient of the National Science Foundation Graduation Research Fellowship, the Qualcomm Innovation Fellowship, and the Gaetano Borriello Outstanding Student Award at UbiComp 2018.
Job Titles:
- Senior Scientist - Ontario Cancer Institute & University Health Network
Job Titles:
- Creative Designer & Project Management
Alex has worked at Techna since April 2015, where they do a number of tasks from building and designing websites, to creating branding for companies and departments including logo design. They have also worked on numerous print design projects and a number of video editing jobs. Currently, they run the Techna social media sites and are the head designer for the Techna Marketing team.
Job Titles:
- Professor and Dan Family Chair in Neurosurgery
Job Titles:
- Research Associate for the Agile Surgical Engineering Program
- Research Associate I ( Intermediate Engineer )
In January 2019, Anuja joined Techna Institute as a Research Associate for the Agile Surgical Engineering Program. Prior to her role at Techna, she worked as a Clinical Engineer at Massachusetts General Hospital, where she was involved in managing medical equipment throughout its life cycle.
Anuja has a BEng. Electrical and Bio medical Engineering degree from McMaster University (2013) and an MHSc. Clinical Engineering degree from University of Toronto (2015).
Job Titles:
- CMP
- Financial Business Manager
Arthur Wong, CPA, CMA, CMP, is Financial Business Manager at Techna and UHN Research Financial Service Core Facilities. He spent 12 years at Altum Health, a revenue generating department at UHN before he joined Techna. He is also a facilitator, marker and mentor for Chartered Professional Accountants (CPA) Canada. Arthur is actively involved in the basketball officiating community, serving as the Treasurer for the Ontario Association of Basketball Officials and the local board, York Region Association of Basketball Officials. He is on the Audit Committee for various non-profit organizations, such as Community Head Injury Resource Services.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Executive Vice President, Science and Research, UHN / Interim Director, Techna Institute / Senior Scientist, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre
- Interim Director
Dr. Bradly Wouters serves as Techna's Interim Director, and also as UHN's Executive Vice President of Science and Research. Prior to his appointment as EVP at UHN in 2016, he served as the Interim Director of Research at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre. He is a Senior Scientist at Princess Margaret and Director of the Princess Margaret Hypoxia Program, a Senior Investigator at the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research, and is a Professor in the Departments of Medical Biophysics and Radiation Oncology at the University of Toronto.
His research is focused on understanding the tumour microenvironment, primarily hypoxia (a lack of oxygen in parts of the tumour) and how hypoxia influences the biology of tumours and how they respond to treatment. His group is working to determine the changes in gene expression in hypoxic tumours, and assessing the potential of targeting hypoxic responses to improve the treatment of cancer.
Brandon is involved many facets of QIPCM project from development and maintenance of the Image Archival and Analysis framework to the analysis of functional imaging results from multicenter trials. He is also the primary contact at QIPCM for multi-center scanner QA and validation for functional imaging including PET-CT/MR and DCE-CT.
Brandon obtained his Bachelor's degree (B.A.Sc.) in Chemical Engineering with Software Option from the University of Waterloo in 2004. Throughout his co-op work terms Brandon gained experience in many facets of engineering from petro-chemicals and the automotive industry to computer programming. He went on to complete a Masters of Biomedical Engineering (M.A.Sc.) from the Institute of Biomaterials & Biomedical Engineering at the University of Toronto. His thesis focused on the development of an inhibitory peptide for the TGF-beta signal pathway in hematopoietic stem cells.
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor at the University of Toronto
- Associate Professor: Department of Radiation Oncology
Catherine Coolens is an Associate Professor at the University of Toronto, Department of Radiation Oncology and a Staff Medical Physicist in the Radiation Medicine Program at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre - University Health Network. She received her PhD in Medical Radiation Physics under Steve Webb at the Institute of Cancer Research, University of London working on Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy optimization. She consequently obtained her board-certification and worked as a clinical physicist at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London (UK) where she worked on organ-motion tracking and gated imaging and therapy techniques prior to moving to Toronto in 2008.
Job Titles:
- Senior Technical Specialist
Job Titles:
- Scientist, Department of Radiation Physics
Job Titles:
- Professor at Université De Montréal
Job Titles:
- Scientific Staff Member
- Head Radiochemist and Manager of R & D
Job Titles:
- Head and Associate Professor, Division of Vascular & Interventional Radiology
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- Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology, University of Toronto
Dr. Alejandro (Ale) Berlin obtained his Medical Degree as valedictorian from the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. He underwent radiation oncology specialty training in Chile, Israel and Canada, which included a clinical-research fellowship and a MSc degree in genitourinary translational oncology at the University of Toronto. Currently, he is a staff clinician-scientist radiation oncologist at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre (Toronto, Canada). His clinical practice focuses in the characterization of genitourinary malignancies with molecular and MR imaging, and novel applications of curative treatments combining systemic, stereotactic radiotherapy and MR-guided brachytherapy approaches. He is particularly interested in the design of innovative clinical trials, translational oncology, and the discovery of biomarkers using high-throughput genomics. Dr. Berlin leads the clinical deployment of novel technologies such as AI-based radiotherapy planning methods for prostate cancer, and Techna's development and application of technology to enable the routine collection of outcomes at the point of care. At this early stage of his career Ale aims to convey his clinical and research expertise towards improving and individualizing the treatments for patients with prostate cancer.
Job Titles:
- Techna 's Interim Director
Job Titles:
- Ophthalmologist
- Senior Scientist Head of Health Informatics Research
Dr. Brenda Gallie is an ophthalmologist who has focused on the rare cancer in children, retinoblastoma. She is Affiliated Faculty in Techna, Senior Scientist at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Director of the Retinoblastoma Program at SickKids Hospital and Professor of Ophthalmology, Molecular Genetics, and Medical Biophysics, University of Toronto. Dr. Gallie was named Distinguished Scientist of the Canadian Institutes for Health Research and received the Order of Ontario for implementing genetic knowledge in care of children with retinoblastoma across Canada.
Dr. Gallie and her research team for over 30 years has contributed to recognition that cancer is a genetic disease. They detailed mechanisms and mutated genes that predispose patients to multiple cancers, when normal cells mutate to premalignant to cancer. In order to deliver this knowledge to cost-effective health care and improve outcomes, Dr. Gallie founded a not-for-profit company that serves as a model of public-private partnership integrating genome knowledge into patient care. To improve quality of complex care, Dr. Gallie and the Techna Health Informatics Research team have built eCare, a disease-specific point-of-care tool extending the health record, and providing highest quality clinical data for research.
Dr. Gallie has focused on the rare cancer of the eye, retinoblastoma. Not satisfied that only 8% of the affected children lucky to live in developed countries, have access to effective care, she and colleagues initiated One Retinoblastoma World. Relevant local stakeholders develop National Strategies to address research, evidence-based care guidelines and socio-economic hurdles, so that the 8,000 children affected by retinoblastoma each year can all access optimal care. For example, the eCare(retinoblastoma) database is functioning on a national server in Kenya, empowering multidisciplinary care close to home. A Global to Local model is delivering personalized genomics to families in India, China and Africa.
Job Titles:
- Director of the Centre for Innovation
Dr. Howard Abrams is co-founder and current Director of the Centre for Innovation in Complex Care (CICC) and is the Director, Clinical Integration, with Techna. He is also the Division Head of General Internal Medicine for the University Health Network, and for Mount Sinai Hospital. Dr. Abrams received a BSc in Engineering from the University of Guelph and his MD from McMaster University. He obtained his specialty certificate in Internal Medicine (FRCPC) while at Toronto General Hospital, and trained in Clinical Epidemiology both at McMaster and the University of Toronto. His expertise is in leveraging his over 30 years on the front-line of clinical care with his experience in optimizing processes to achieve successful integration of innovative solutions into the clinical environment. He has been the physician lead on a number of innovations at UHN including the ED-GIM Re-Design project, and one of the first successful introductions of Computer Physician Order Entry (CPOE) at a major academic hospital in North America.
Job Titles:
- Director, Interventional Thoracic Surgery
Dr. Howard Ginsberg is a neurosurgeon at St. Michael's Hospital. He has a degree in Engineering Science from the University of Toronto as well as a PhD in Biomedical Engineering and currently holds the position of Assistant Professor in the Department of Surgery and the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering. Howard's research focuses on engineering applications to neurosurgical procedures with the goal of improving safety and outcome for patients. His current projects include: Mass Spectrometry Imaging, Diagnosis and Guidance in Surgery; Spinal Implants; Intraoperative Surgical Navigation; Therapeutic and Diagnostic Ultrasound.
Job Titles:
- Professor of Surgery
- Professor of Surgery, Neurosurgery Division
Dr. James Drake is Professor of Surgery, Division Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at the Hospital for Sick Children and holds the Harold Hoffman Shoppers Drug Mart Chair. He is a Senior Associate Scientist in the Sickkids Research Institute, and leads the Centre of Image Guided Innovation and Therapeutic Intervention and co-lead of the Centre of Excellence in Image Guided Care. He is also Co-Director of the Centre of Mathematical Medicine at the Fields Institute at the University of Toronto.
He was educated at Princeton University (1969-1974), Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (1974), University of Toronto (1986-1987), and Royal College of Surgeons of Canada (1987). Training included a research fellowship funded by the Medical Research Council of Canada (1986-1987) in Hydrocephalus. Dr. Drake assumed his appointment in the Department of Surgery, Division of Neurosurgery in 1988, and has been on the surgical staff at The Hospital for Sick Children in the Division of Paediatric Neurosurgery since then.
Dr. Drake's primary research and clinical interests relate to engineering applications to neurosurgery including image guided surgery and robotics. This encompasses the main themes of CIGITI which is broadened to include applications of imaging, robotics, and simulation for all pediatric surgical disciplines. He is on the executive of the Hydrocephalus Clinical Research Network, and head of the Medical Advisory Board of the Spinal Bifida and Hydrocephalus Assocation of Ontario. Dr. Drake has over 230 peer reviewed publications, holds major grants from CIHR/NSERC, and Brain Canada. His clinical interests relate to the investigation and management of hydrocephalus including the use of endoscopy, image guided surgery for brain tumours and epilepsy, and the management of complex spinal disorders.
Job Titles:
- Assistant Professor
- Assistant Professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology
Dr. Jean-Pierre Bissonnette is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology and the Director of Physics Education. He has received his M.Sc. in Medical Radiation Physics from McGill University in 1991 and his Ph.D. from the University of Western Ontario in 1996. He is a Member of the Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine.
His academic and clinical interests include megavoltage imaging, image-guided radiation therapy, extracranial radiosurgery, 4DCT and 4DPET imaging applications for adaptive radiation therapy of the lung and monitoring of response to therapy, quality assurance, error elimination, and improving safety of the clinical processes.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Executive Director, Center for EHealth Innovation
Dr. Joseph Cafazzo is the Lead for UHN's Centre for Global eHealth Innovation, a state-of-the-art research facility devoted to the evaluation and design of healthcare technology, hosting seventy researchers and staff. As a biomedical engineer, Dr. Cafazzo observes healthcare delivery from the inside-out and works on ways to keep people out of hospital by creating technologies that allow for self-care at home.
He has created numerous award-winning mobile health apps, including bant, an application design for adolescents for the self-management for type 1 diabetes, which received the Stanford 2.0 Award. In 2018, he was named the inaugural holder of the Wolfond Chair in Digital Health. Furthermore, at the University of Toronto, Dr. Cafazzo is an Associate Professor at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation and the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Executive Director for Translational Research and Cores Facilities at UHN
- Executive Director, Translational Research and Core Facilities
Dr. Luke Brzozowski is the Executive Director for Translational Research and Cores Facilities at UHN a portfolio that covers 20 business units UHN and a number of large scale innovation programs. He also leads Techna's Technology Development Team, made out of technical project managers, engineers, and software developers, as well as operational, quality, regulatory, and marketing professionals who lead, manage, and carry out health technology productization programs and projects in a hospital environment. Luke also leads the Diagnostic Research Office for the Joint Department of Medical Imaging and Laboratory Medicine Program at UHN and serves as the President of the Board of CanProbe, a startup in the field of molecular imaging and theranostics.
Prior to joining Techna at its inception (then as Director of Operations and Engineering), Luke held management positions in the development, marketing, legal, and regulatory departments in the health technology industry and pharmaceutical CRO. Luke is the recipient of the 2003 Governor General's Gold Medal for his Doctorate.
Job Titles:
- Scientific Staff Member
- Scientist
Dr. Margarete Akens is a Scientist at the Techna Institute and an Assistant Professor at the Department of Surgery and a Faculty member of the Spine Program at the University of Toronto. She received her PhD from the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine at the University in Zurich, Switzerland, in 2002.
Her research interests include bone related cancers and bone repair with focus on the development of innovative treatment options. She has extensive experience working with pre-clinical bone cancer models and studying the effect of photodynamic therapy on both cancer cells and bone. Additionally she will lead the emerging Comparative Oncology Program at STTARR. Cancer occurs naturally in animals with a similar frequency as in humans, but due to the shorter life span everything happens faster. This program focus on collaboration between Veterinarians and Physicians to accelerate the knowledge about cancer biology and clinical care.
Job Titles:
- Assistant Professor
- Affiliated Scientist
Farzad Khalvati is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medical Imaging with cross-appointment to the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto, and an Associate Scientist at The Hospital for Sick Children. His research expertise and interests are multidisciplinary and include Artificial Intelligence (Transfer Learning, Attention Networks, CNN-based Survival Analysis, Multi-task Learning), Computer Vision, Discovery Radiomics, Computational Diffusion MRI, Decision Support Systems, High Performance Computing, and Human-AI Interface with wide applications in Medical Imaging and Precision Medicine. Dr. Khalvati is an active researcher in the field and he has produced more than 90 peer-reviewed publications (journal papers, patents, book chapters, conference full papers and abstracts).
Dr. Khalvati received his PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from University of Waterloo and before joining University of Toronto, he worked as an imaging and AI scientist in biomedical industry and then as a Research Associate at Sunnybrook Research Institute. Dr. Khalvati is a recipient of several awards from NSERC, OCE, and CIHR and his dissertation was selected and patented by the University of Waterloo Commercialization Office.
Gabor Fichtinger received the Ph.D. degree in computer science from the Technical University of Budapest, Budapest, Hungary, in 1990. He is currently a Professor in the School of Computing, with cross appointments in the departments of Mechanical and Material Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Surgery, Queen's University, Kingston, ON, Canada, where he also directs the Percutaneous Surgery Laboratory.
He is also adjunct professor in Radiology and Computer Science at the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, USA. His research specializes on medical image computing and computer assisted interventions, primarily for the diagnosis and therapy of cancer. Dr. Fichtinger is a Senior Member of IEEE, Distinguished Lecturer of IEEE EMBS, and a Fellow of MICCAI. Dr. Fichtinger also holds a Level-1 Cancer Care Ontario Research Chair in Cancer Imaging.
Job Titles:
- Research Strategy Development Specialist
Grant joined Techna in fall 2019 as a Research Strategy Development Specialist. He supports the development of strategic funding proposals and communications that promote Techna's research and productization initiatives. Grant is based with the UHN Strategic Research Initiatives Development (StRIDe) team, where he helps with institution-wide activities in addition to those of Techna.
Prior to joining Techna, Grant was conducting research as a doctoral candidate. Nanotechnology has been a key focus of his education and research experience. Grant received his Bachelor of Science in Nanoscience from the University of Guelph in 2014 and then his Doctor of Philosophy in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Toronto in 2019.
Job Titles:
- Scientific Staff Member
- Scientific Associate
Gregory Bootsma graduated from the University of Waterloo with a B.A.Sc. and M.A.Sc. from the Department of Engineering, where he focused on algorithm design, computer vision, and 3D reconstruction. Upon graduation Gregory joined the Image Guided Therapeutics (IGTx) lab working with Dr. David Jaffray and Dr. Jeff Siewerdsen developing both hardware and software for radiation and surgical guidance systems. Gregory went on to do a Ph.D. in the Department of Medical Biophysics at the University of Toronto under the supervision of Dr. Jaffray. The focus of his thesis was reducing scatter in Cone-beam CT through the use of physics and computational methods to improve image quality. Gregory continues to work to improve X-ray imaging using Monte Carlo techniques to model and generate new X-ray source design, improve image quality, and facilitate overall imaging system design.
Job Titles:
- Techna Research Strategy Development Specialist
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Director, Research Faculty ( Clinical )
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- Associate Technical Analyst
Job Titles:
- Director, Interventional Thoracic Surgery
Job Titles:
- Medical Director, UHN International Strategy
Lynette Chen joined Techna in April 2015 as a research clerk. Most recently, she worked for the Department of Radiation Physics at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, where she provided secretarial and clerical services in support of administrative staff and physicists.
Lynette earned a Master's in Language and Literacies Education from the University of Toronto and served as a research assistant for Department of Applied Psychology & Human Development, OISE.
Lynette loves reading, painting and traveling. Life makes its turns and she learns to go with the flow, never forgetting to "smell the roses".
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Director of Commercialization
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Director of Digital Health and Senior Scientist
Job Titles:
- Scientific Staff Member
- Staff Scientist
Job Titles:
- Professor of Surgery ( Urology )
Job Titles:
- President & CEO Cancer Care Ontario
Job Titles:
- Senior Software Developer
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- Chief of Cardiothoracic Imaging
Job Titles:
- Business Development Officer
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Director, Research Faculty ( Physical Sciences )
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Chief Medical Information Officer, UHN
Job Titles:
- Research Scientist, Centre for Global EHealth Innovation, UHN
Dr. Ralph DaCosta received his PhD from the Department of Medical Biophysics, University of Toronto. His graduate research focused on the development and pioneering clinical application of advanced optical molecular imaging technologies for endoscopic diagnosis of early gastrointestinal cancers.
This work contributed to major improvements in the accuracy of conventional diagnostic endoscopy. These continue to directly benefit endoscopic cancer screening strategies around the world. Dr. DaCosta is a Scientist, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network (UHN). He is developing a comprehensive research program at UHN that focuses on accelerating the translation of these "bioimaging" capabilities directly into clinical practice. He also is a member of the Radiation Medicine Program (Princess Margaret Cancer Centre) and the Spatio-Temporal Targeted and Amplification of Radiation Response (STTARR) Innovation Center at UHN.
Dr. DaCosta is one of Canada's leading experts in the area of biophotonics. His ongoing contribution to the field of cancer imaging has been recognized by numerous awards and invited presentations at international meetings.
Job Titles:
- Business Application Analyst
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor
- Department of Mechanical
Timothy Chan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering and Director of the Centre for Healthcare Engineering at the University of Toronto. His primary research interests are in optimization under uncertainty and the application of optimization methods to problems in healthcare, medicine, global engineering, sustainability, and sports. He received his B.Sc. in Applied Mathematics from the University of British Columbia, and his Ph.D. in Operations Research from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Before coming to Toronto, he was an Associate in the Chicago office of McKinsey and Company, a global management consulting firm. During that time, he advised leading companies in the fields of medical device technology, travel and hospitality, telecommunications, and energy on issues of strategy, organization, technology and operations.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Manager, Research Planning and Operations
Job Titles:
- Research Associate I ( Intermediate Engineer )
Job Titles:
- Scientific Staff Member
- Lead MRI Scientist
Dr. Foltz is the research MRI physicist at the STTARR Innovation Centre, where he operates and consults on MRI projects using a 7 Tesla Biospec (Bruker Corporation). He specializes in quantitative MRI applications, and his experience ranges across a broad range of MRI biomarkers, field strengths, and animal and disease models. He is currently an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Radiation Oncology, and within that role, he supports MRI quality assurance and clinical MRI trials utilizing quantitative applications within the Radiation Medicine Program at The Princess Margaret. He received his Ph.D. from Medical Biophysics at the University of Toronto.