Supporting perinatal research to improve maternal and infant health outcomes.
Applications are now being accepted for the 2024 grants.
Click HERE for details.
About the MTPRF
The Molly Towell Perinatal Research Foundation (MTPRF) was established in 1988 as a legacy of the estate of Dr. Molly Towell. Dr. Towell was a pioneering clinician-scientist in the field of maternal-fetal medicine and had a particular interest in the influence of maternal nutrition on infant outcomes. For more about Dr. Towell, see About Molly Towell. Dr. Towell instructed that the major objectives of the Foundation were:
To fund graduate and undergraduate fellowships for individuals in the field of fetal and neonatal medicine
To provide start-up operating funds to assist in research and education in the field of fetal and neonatal medicine
The overall goal of the MTPRF is to encourage perinatal research in Canada. As per Dr. Towell’s direction, the Foundation will support original and innovative research, which she defined as the pursuit of new information derived from basic or clinical research. High priority is given to projects that concern fetal growth or metabolism, but any studies that involve original research in fetal or neonatal medicine will be considered. Purely epidemiological research or clinical trials, however, will not be considered.
2023 MTPRF Fellowship Award Recipients
The Molly Towell Perinatal Research Foundation's Board of Directors would like to thank all applicants to the 2023 fellowship competition. Congratulations to our recipients below, and we look forward to the outcomes of their studies!
Michelle Asbury
Systems-level repertoire of human milk components as drivers of microbial and immune development in preterm infants
The health of preterm babies is strongly related to the composition of microbes living in their gut (called the gut microbiome). For example, an abnormal gut microbiome can increase the risk of inflammatory conditions in preterm babies during their early-life and into childhood. During her PhD, Dr. Asbury found that the composition of maternal milk influences the microbial development in preterm infants. Specifically, she showed that human milk components, including milk microbes and added nutritional products, have the potential to change the colonization of the preterm infant gut. These human milk-associated bacteria have been shown by her current post-doc supervisor, Dr. Marie-Claire Arrieta, to reduce gut inflammation and accelerate maturation of the gut microbiome of preterm infants. Dr. Asbury joins Dr. Arrieta’s research group at the University of Calgary to study how the nutritional and immune composition of maternal milk shapes the gut microbiome and immune system of preterm babies using advanced molecular techniques. Her project has the potential to inform interventions and develop novel nutritional products to improve the health of preterm babies.
Wojciech Durlak
Novel regenerative strategy in neonatal pulmonary hypertension
Congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH) is a life-threatening anomaly affecting babies at birth, with high mortality rates from pulmonary hypertension causing poor blood flow in the lungs of affected babies. Endothelial colony-forming cells (ECFCs) are a special type of cells that play an important role in the development of blood vessels in the lungs during fetal life. However, a lot is still to be discovered about the biology of these cells in humans. Dr. Wojciech Durlak is a neonatologist from Poland who completed a PhD in clinical research. In August 2022, he joined the lab of Dr. Bernard Thébaud at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, on a project aiming to understand why babies with CDH develop pulmonary hypertension and how we can help them grow new blood vessels in their lungs. His research will robustly characterize the biology of ECFCs isolated from the umbilical cord blood of these babies, compare their function with the cells originating in healthy control babies and test the therapeutic potential of ECFCs in animal models relevant to pulmonary hypertension associated with CDH.
Shuhiba Mohammad
Uncovering epigenetic drivers of human trophoblast stem cell self-renewal and differentiation to model early placental development
The placenta is vital for a healthy pregnancy. Unfortunately, sometimes it does not function properly. We lack models to understand placental diseases in humans. This lab has developed a groundbreaking human trophoblast stem cell model that can recapitulate all main placental cell types. When placental cells form, their program gets set through “epigenetic” modification of the genomic material, prompting some genes to be more or less active in a cell and tissue-specific manner. The goals of this study are to define the epigenetic ground state of the cells in this model, and to understand how the epigenetic program of these cells changes as they differentiate into other placental cell types. Dr. Mohammad completed a Master’s degree at the University of Guelph, followed by a second Master’s degree at Queen’s University and a PhD at the University of Ottawa. After her PhD, she joined the Lab of Dr. Myriam Hemberger and Dr. Wendy Dean, at the University of Calgary, who are experts in Canada in this area of research. Dr. Mohammad’s studies will provide novel insights into the unexplored and indispensable biological pathways regulating the development of the placenta early on in embryonic life, necessary for supporting the fetus.