Celebrating each day’s success

Mauricio Rodriguez-Torres, PhD Candidate, Anatomy and Cell Biology, has always believed that nothing is worth doing unless others gain a positive and enjoyable benefit.

This altruistic principle led him to a career in medical research, specifically in patient-relevant research, and a prestigious Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship.

Rodriguez-Torres' love for basic research brought him to Schulich Medicine & Dentistry from his native Columbia to study metastasis in breast cancer. Metastasis, the process by which tumour cells spread from one organ to establish themselves in others, is a neglected field in cancer research.

However, it is a field that deserves more attention, as Rodriguez-Torres noted, "the primary tumour in the breast is not what is killing women with breast cancer. What is killing them are the metastases - the cause of 90 per cent of breast cancer-derived deaths."

Working under Alison Allan, PhD, graduate chair, Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology at Schulich Medicine & Dentistry, and oncology scientist with the London Regional Cancer Program, their lab is focused on reducing metastatic breast cancer from a fatal disease to a curable condition.

While his biggest challenge has been to re-learn cell biology and cancer biology, his greatest success came recently, as he was awarded a Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship.

Vanier Scholarships are designed to attract and retain world-class doctoral students by offering them a significant financial award, a prize of up to $50,000 per year for up to three years, during studies at a Canadian university.

Vanier Scholars tend to be leaders with a high standard of scholarly achievement, both things that describe Rodriguez-Torres. For Rodriguez-Torres, a married father of three, being awarded the Vanier Scholarship will help him focus on his research, as it eases the financial burden of graduate studies.

He hopes that receiving this prestigious scholarship for his project investigating metastasis, will boost this overlooked area to become more prevalent in research circles. With this award, he believes "our voice is going to sound a little bit louder within the academic community for a while."

His inspiration lies in "the results of today's experiment", and the hope that through his research, deaths from metastasis will be reduced drastically, offering others the opportunity for a positive and enjoyable life after cancer.