LMP320H1 – Pathobiology of Stem Cells

Enrolment is limited to students in the Pathobiology specialist program.

Course description

This course introduces stem cells and their impact on human health and disease.

You will study stem cells from the perspective of development and disease, with a focus on the nervous system, respiratory system, and cancer.

This course is intended to provide a foundation in the basis of stem cells in preparation for fourth-year courses.

By the end of this course you will be able to:

• Describe basic concepts of stem cells and their biology.
• Describe the underlying principles of stem cell biology in the development of the nervous and respiratory systems.
• Describe the cancer stem cell hypothesis and the possible role of cancer stem cells in cancer development and progression. 
• Effectively communicate and apply concepts of stem cell biology to discuss the pros and cons of stem cell related issues and media.

Course coordinators

Dr. Sunit Das

Office address: St. Michael’s Hospital, 30 Bond St
sunit.das@utoronto.ca

Dr. Amy Wong

Office address: SickKids, 686 Bay St, PGCRL Rm 17-904
apwong@sickkids.ca

Dr. Scott Yuzwa

Office address: 1 King’s College Circle, MSB Rm 6336 
scott.yuzwa@utoronto.ca

Teaching assistant

Jennifer Boateng

jen.boateng@mail.utoronto.ca

Course details

• Hours: 24L/12T
• Prerequisite information: Enrolment is limited to students in the Pathobiology specialist program.
• Prerequisite: LMP200H1
• Exclusions: None
• Recommended preparation: None
• Distribution requirements: Science
• Breadth requirement: Living Things and Their Environment (4)          
• Enrolment limits: 35 students

Student evaluation

Participation/Attendance: 5%

Writing Assignment: 15%

Quiz 1: 20% (After Lectures 1 - 4)

Quiz 2: 20% (After Lecture 5 - 8) 

Final Exam (to occur during the final exam period): 40%;

See information on Academic Integrity

Schedule

Lecture topics are subject to change. We will list finalized lecture topics in the official syllabus

Recommended reading or text book

None.

Note from the Instructors

Hello Everyone and Welcome to LMP320H1! We are Drs. Yuzwa, Wong and Das and are the main instructors for LMP320H1: Pathobiology of Stem Cells.

We hope that you’ll come along with us on our journey to study the beauty and the promise of stem cell biology in physiology and disease. We’re very much committed to helping each of you get the most possible out of this course and if there are ways that we can improve the course to make that possible we would be happy to hear any of your feedback (either in class, via e-mail or on Quercus).

It is our strong belief that the classroom environment for LMP320H1 should be welcoming and inclusive for all members of this class from both an EDI perspective and from a scientific  background perspective. Please think of the lecture environment as a “safe” one and we will do our best to foster and model that safe learning environment. We are all coming from different backgrounds with different lived experiences thus please consider that you may know more than some of your classmates in specific areas and they may know more than you in other areas. It is the union of everyone’s expertise that will hopefully make LMP320H1 a great experience. In that regard, you are free to ask any question that comes to mind (related to the material at hand). We may not know the answer but we can always find the answer together. 

Finally, LMP320H1 will be delivered in person. Many more details with respect to course delivery and polices are described in greater detail in the Course Info Section and in the Course Syllabus on Quercus. Should you have any questions about this course which are not answered in the Syllabus or on Quercus please feel free to reach out to us by email at the addresses below (depending on the section to which the question pertains):

Dr. Yuzwa, scott.yuzwa@utoronto.ca
Dr. Wong, apwong@sickkids.ca
Dr. Das, sunit.das@utoronto.ca

Sincerely,

Drs. Scott Yuzwa, Amy Wong and Sunit Das