Hamilton teen takes top science fair honours with cancer research

May 20, 2005

YSF Canada announced its top young scientists for 2005 at the Canada-Wide Science Fair in Vancouver, British Columbia today.

Medical research on ways to treat cancer with a genetically modified virus, while protecting healthy body cells, earned Natalie Raso, a Grade 10 student at Hamilton’s St. Thomas More Catholic School, more than $17,000 in cash prizes, a divisional gold medal, and scholarship offers at the 2005 Canada Wide Science Fair concluding tomorrow at the University of British Columbia.

In the first round of judging, Natalie earned a gold medal and $1500 for placing first in the Intermediate Health Sciences Division, sponsored by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). The National Judging Panel then named her winner of the $5000 EnCana Platinum Award (Best Intermediate) and subsequently tapped her for the $10,000 EnCana Best of Fair Award.

Natalie Raso has stepped into a world of groundbreaking research. Successful cancer treatment requires the ability to selectively induce death of cancerous cells but not harm normal cells. “Drugs used in chemotherapy not only affect cancerous cells but also cause harmful and unwanted toxicity to normal cells. My research focused on harnessing the natural properties of viruses to aid in the fight against cancer. The exciting field of oncolytic virus therapy is now being tested in limited trials around the world.” she explained. View project highlights.

Two Grade 12 students at North Bay's École Algonquin catholique secondaire, Patrick Danielson and Robin Miron, won the $5000 EnCana Platinum Award (Best Senior), complementing that top prize with more than $6000 in additional cash including a $4500 Manning Young Canadian Innovator Award, the Gold Medal and $1500 in the Engineering & Computing Sciences Division, sponsored by Intel Canada. Other awards for the duo included selection as one of three finalists in the running to represent Canada at the prestigious Stockholm Junior Water Prize competition in Sweden in August.

The pair created an innovative marine sampling technology - a flow-through sampler that can quickly and efficiently collect micro-invertebrate samples from large water bodies, do it in real time, and provide data that can be used immediately or back at the lab, thereby increasing the qualitative value of, and more specific locations for, macro-invertebrate populations that are critical to marine research. View project highlights.

In the Junior Division, Yale Michaels, a Grade 8 student at Winnipeg’s Grant Park High School, was named winner of the $5000 EnCana Platinum Award (Best Junior), complementing that prize with the Gold Medal and $1500 in the Health Sciences Division, sponsored by CIHR, and additional prizes including the second place junior award from Genome Canada.

Yale’s project focused on gap junctions, which are intercellular channels found throughout the body. “They allow for movement of molecules between cells. I studied whether gap junctions were necessary for the survival of certain cancer cells. My results showed that inhibiting gap junctions reduced the ability of cells to survive ultraviolet radiation. This may apply to cancer research,” said the two-time national finalist who plans to continue pursuing national-level science projects. View project highlights.

Download complete results of the 2005 Canada-Wide Science as an Excel document here:

 CWSF 2005 Results (Excel)

A PDF version of the results will be available later.