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Ranked among the world’s top medical schools with the fifth-largest MD enrollment in North America, the UBC Faculty of Medicine is a leader in both the science and the practice of medicine. Across British Columbia, more than 12,000 faculty and staff are training the next generation of doctors, health care professionals, and medical researchers, making remarkable discoveries to help create the pathways to better health for our communities at home and around the world.
The UBC Faculty of Medicine offers a diverse array of training opportunities including cutting-edge research experiences in the biosciences, globally recognized population health education, quality health professional training, as well as several certificate and online training options. The Faculty of Medicine is home to more than 1,700 graduate students housed in 20 graduate programs (14 of which offer doctoral research options). Year after year, research excellence in the Faculty of Medicine is supported by investment from funding sources here at home and around the globe, receiving approximately more than $1.8B in total research funding since 2016.
We value our trainees and the creative input they have to scholarly activities at UBC. Our priority is to enable their maximum potential through flexible opportunities that provide a breadth of experiences tailored to their own individual career objectives. We maintain high standards of excellence, and work to create a community of intellectually and socially engaged scholars that work collaboratively with each other, the university, and the world, with the overarching goal of promoting the health of individuals and communities.
Most Faculty research is conducted under the auspices of 23 centres and institutes that are part of UBC or affiliated with it, in collaboration with our health partners.
UBC Faculty of Medicine provides innovative educational and research programs in the areas of health and life sciences through an integrated and province-wide delivery model in facilities at locations throughout British Columbia.
The Life Sciences Centre is the largest building on the UBC Vancouver campus. Completed in 2004, the $125 million, 52,165 sq metres building was built to accommodate the distributed medical educational program and the Life Sciences Institute.
The Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health (DMCBH), a partnership between the University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health, unites under one roof research and clinical expertise in neuroscience, psychiatry and neurology in order to accelerate discovery and translate new knowledge into better treatment and prevention strategies. DMCBH has both laboratory and clinical research areas within the Centre proper and in the UBC Hospital Koerner Pavilion. Our core facilities are essential to ongoing collaboration, teaching, and research.
The BC Children's Hospital Research Institute is it the largest research institute of its kind in Western Canada in terms of people, productivity, funding and size. With more than 350,000 square feet of space, the Institute has both 'wet bench' laboratory and 'dry lab' clinical research areas, and other areas to facilitate particular areas of research and training.
New knowledge and innovation are crucial to successfully identifying, addressing and overcoming the increasingly complex health-related challenges that influence the lives of all of us – in British Columbia, in Canada, and in countries and communities around the globe.
The UBC Faculty of Medicine is recognized nationally and internationally for research innovation that advances knowledge and translates new discoveries to improve the health and well-being of individuals and communities. Research opportunities feature extensive collaborations across other faculties, health institutions and health partners across British Columbia, Canada and internationally.
The Faculty provides and fosters research excellence across the full continuum, from basic science to applied science and then to knowledge implementation, with a focus on precision health; cancer; brain and mental health; heart and lung health; population health; and chronic diseases.
This is an incomplete sample of recent publications in chronological order by UBC faculty members with a primary appointment in the Faculty of Medicine.
| Year | Citation | Program |
|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Dr. Cao studied two important risk factors associated with age-related macular degeneration, or AMD. She found that environmental and genetic risk factors can trigger an overdrive in the body's immune system, which leads to chronic inflammation and damage in the eye tissues. Her findings will help develop new strategies to stop AMD development and prevent vision loss in the elderly. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Sabatini examined the dynamics and mechanism governing the expression of the transcription factor Npas4 within pancreatic beta cells. Additionally, he explored how NPAS4 impacts beta cell function and glucose homoeostasis. | Doctor of Philosophy in Cell and Developmental Biology (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Bashar developed stem cell based therapy targeting inherited disorders that affect vision. His approaches prevented progressive damage to neurons and improved vision in model organisms. Most importantly, the techniques he developed for these treatments are highly transferable to other disease systems. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Zafari developed state-of-the-art decision-analytic models to evaluate four major care gaps in respiratory medicine, primarily in asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). His PhD research provides a framework for future research advancements in precision medicine in COPD. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Chen's work focused on developing lipid nanoparticles for improved drug delivery. In particular, he developed safer and more effective nanoparticles to enable clinical use of genetic drugs for previously untreatable diseases. | Doctor of Philosophy in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Trane characterized a novel therapeutic target by studying the interaction between two proteins found in blood vessels involved in heart disease development. His work will hopefully help create new drugs that can be used to treat cardiovascular problems such as stroke, heart attacks and high blood pressure. | Doctor of Philosophy in Pharmacology (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Pesarchuk characterized a novel role for the protein MCL-1 in regulating chromatin architecture and promoting DNA repair. This work adds to the understanding of MCL-1's multifunctionality and presents a new way to target this protein in the treatment of the numerous types of cancer known to depend on it. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
| 2016 | In her work, Dr. Girling investigated novel, preventative, therapeutic mechanisms for Huntington's Disease, an inherited neurodegenerative disease. By designing and testing small peptide drugs, Dr. Girling worked on three potential drug targets to prevent or delay cell death in Huntington's Disease brains. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Rozmus discovered new inherited immunodeficiencies. He also showed how these discoveries lead to successful clinical interventions and provided insights into the normal function of the immune system and disease mechanisms. | Doctor of Philosophy in Pathology and Laboratory Medicine (PhD) |
| 2016 | Dr. Meng studied caveolin-1, a cell surface protein associated with cancer. Dr. Meng identified multiple mechanisms that impact how caveolin-1 regulates cancer cell adhesion and migration. This is important for understanding how caveolin-1 promotes cancer and potentially for how it can be targeted for cancer therapy. | Doctor of Philosophy in Cell and Developmental Biology (PhD) |