Toronto Western Hospital 3 articles published in JoVE Genetics Targeted Next-generation Sequencing and Bioinformatics Pipeline to Evaluate Genetic Determinants of Constitutional Disease Allison A. Dilliott1,2, Sali M.K. Farhan3, Mahdi Ghani4, Christine Sato4, Eric Liang5, Ming Zhang4, Adam D. McIntyre1, Henian Cao1, Lemuel Racacho6,7, John F. Robinson1, Michael J. Strong1,8, Mario Masellis9,10, Dennis E. Bulman6,7, Ekaterina Rogaeva4, Anthony Lang10,11, Carmela Tartaglia4,10, Elizabeth Finger12,13, Lorne Zinman9, John Turnbull14, Morris Freedman10,15, Rick Swartz9, Sandra E. Black9,16, Robert A. Hegele1,2 1Robarts Research Institute, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, Western University, 2Department of Biochemistry, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, Western University, 3Analytic and Translational Genetics Unit, Center for Genomic Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, Stanley Centre for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 4Tanz Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases, University of Toronto, 5 Targeted next-generation sequencing is a time- and cost-efficient approach that is becoming increasingly popular in both disease research and clinical diagnostics. The protocol described here presents the complex workflow required for sequencing and the bioinformatics process used to identify genetic variants that contribute to disease. Developmental Biology Isolation of Neural Stem/Progenitor Cells from the Periventricular Region of the Adult Rat and Human Spinal Cord Andrea Mothe1, Charles H. Tator1,2 1Division of Genetics and Development, Toronto Western Research Institute and Krembil Neuroscience Center, 2Department of Surgery, Division of Neurosurgery, Toronto Western Hospital and University of Toronto The adult mammalian spinal cord contains neural stem/progenitor cells (NSPCs) that can be isolated and expanded in culture. This protocol describes the harvesting, isolation, culture, and passaging of NSPCs generated from the periventricular region of the adult spinal cord from the rat and from human organ transplant donors. Medicine A Novel High-resolution In vivo Imaging Technique to Study the Dynamic Response of Intracranial Structures to Tumor Growth and Therapeutics Kelly Burrell1, Sameer Agnihotri1, Michael Leung2, Ralph DaCosta2, Richard Hill2, Gelareh Zadeh3 1Brain Tumor Research Centre, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto Medical Discovery Tower, 2Ontario Cancer Institute, Princess Margaret Hospital, 3Neurosurgery, Toronto Western Hospital We describe a novel in vivo imaging technique that couples fluorescent chimeric mice with intracranial windows and high-resolution 2-photon microscopy. This imaging platform aids studies of dynamic changes in brain tissue and microvasculature, at a single-cell level, following pathological insults and is adaptable to assess intracranial drug delivery and distribution.
