Senior Scientist, Genetics and Genome Biology Program, SickKids Research Institute
Associate Professor, Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto
Canada Research Chair, Molecular Genetics and Neurodegenerative diseases
Dr. Jeehye Park is a Senior Scientist at The Hospital for Sick Children and an Associate Professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto. She aims to make contributions in the research field of neurodegenerative diseases with a particular focus on amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Dr. Park completed her graduate studies in Dr. Jongkyeong Chung’s lab at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology in Daejeon, South Korea. Her thesis focused on studying Parkinson’s disease using Drosophila. To expand her research experience in neurodegenerative diseases, she pursued her postdoctoral studies in Dr. Huda Zoghbi’s lab at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas where she studied spinocerebellar ataxia type 1 (SCA1).
Team members
Oxana graduated from the State University, Chisinau, Republic of Moldova with B. Sc. Honors. Since 2004, Oxana has worked at Boulianne Lab at Hospital for Sick Children as a Technologist and contributed to the studies of obesity and neurodegenerative diseases using Drosophila. Oxana joined Park Lab in 2019, and her research focuses on understanding the mechanisms underlying ALS using MATR3 fly models.
Justin completed his M.Sc. in 2023 in the Park lab studying the mechanisms of how specific disease-associated microglial genes contribute to ALS pathogenesis. He is continuing his research on this topic as a technologist.
Yiting has a B.Sc in Quantitative Biology and M.Sc in Biology at McGill University. She is investigating whether hypermetabolism underlies ALS pathogenesis.
Mohieldin (Mohi) received his PhD from Japan, where his doctoral thesis focused on the molecular mechanisms orchestrating the stress response in the hippocampus. He has a B.Sc in Pharmaceutical Sciences and M.Sc in Pharmacology and Toxicology. Mohi would like to investigate the neurodegenerative mechanisms underlying ALS with special interest in glial cells to translate such understanding into potential therapeutics.
Anneka is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto. She received her M.Sc. from the University of Ottawa in Biochemistry with a specialization in Human and Molecular Genetics where she characterized the knock-out of a chromatin remodeler on cortical development. She is currently investigating the mechanisms which lead to neurodegeneration in the MATR3 S85C mouse model.
Jooyun is currently an M.Sc. candidate in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto. For her project, Jooyun is investigating the role of the innate immune system to determine why selective vulnerability is observed in neurons in ALS.
Jhune is currently an M.Sc candidate in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto. Jhune’s project aims to investigate the mechanism(s) underlying the selective loss of the MATR3 protein in ALS-vulnerable neuronal populations.
Rachel is a fourth year undergraduate Molecular Genetics specialist at the University of Toronto. For her project, she is identifying MATR3 S85C interactors using the SH-SY5Y neuroblastoma cell line.
Curtis is a fourth-year student at the University of Toronto. He is investigating the involvement of astrocytes and their molecular changes that occur during neuronal death in a MATR3 S85C ALS mouse model.
Mark is a second-year undergraduate Molecular Genetics Specialist at the University of Toronto. His project is characterizing microglial phenotypes between wild-type and MATR3 S85C mice.