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After a long wait, the Toronto Centre for Phenogenomics (TCP) is officially open for business. Billed as the largest centre of its kind in Canada, the 110,000 sq ft, state-of-the-art research facility located in the heart of Toronto's Discovery district officially opened Oct. 1st.
It is already projected to become one of the major centres for mouse genetics in the world.
"We are enabling research and we are doing research to make a difference in health care for Canadians," said Dr. Colin McKerlie, the TCP's Interim CEO and a researcher who will be taking advantage of the TCP facilities. According to McKerlie, the Toronto Centre for Phenogenomics (TCP) will house a range of imaging instruments, Canada's largest mouse colony and a cryobank, which together should make it one of the top locations for studying mouse models of human disease.
He adds that work undertaken within the facility will seek cures and treatments in areas such as diabetes, cancer, musculoskeletal disease, cardiovascular and renal function, embryonic development and learning and memory.
Describing the new facility as cutting-edge, Dr. Eliot Phillipson, president and CEO of the CFI, one of the lead contributing organizations to the project, added that the TCP would allow researchers from multiple institutions and disciplines to transform innovative ideas into groundbreaking research.
The facility itself is equipped with specialized laboratories for mice production and analysis, with capacity for up to 36,000 cages.
The initial concept of the TCP originated with Dr. Janet Rossant, a world leader in developmental biology. Dr. Rossant led the grant application to the Canada Foundation for Innovation that quickly became a collaboration among four founding member research hospitals: Mount Sinai Hospital, St. Michael Hospital, The Hospital for Sick Children and the University Health Network (Toronto General Hospital, Toronto Western Hospital and Princess Margaret Hospital).
Funding for the $69 million enterprise was secured through collaboration among different levels of government, the member hospitals and industry.
"This collaboration is a promising response to increasingly constrained resources," said Rossant. "In this facility, we are not only collecting and sharing information, we are sharing decisions and ownership, vision and responsibility - expanding the capacity that is each partner while contributing to the powerhouse that is Toronto's health research community," she said.
