One of the major initiatives in the lab is our work on Lake and round whitefish.  These species are super cool (ha ha) because they are fall spawners.  They don’t spawn until about the middle to end of November, when lake temperatures are dropping and below 10 degrees C.  The Great Lakes are a bit of a beast in late fall, early winter. Strong winds, high waves, rough conditions for a boat.  Both species have short spawns, only about 10-14 days.  If we are lucky, we can get out for about 2 good weather windows for fishing.

The project on whitefish is very collaborative and involves Drs. Chris Somers and Richard Manzon from University of Regina and Dr. Doug Boredom from the Northern Ontario School of Medicine.  Because of the distance and the number of trainees in each of the labs, and a shared field season, we hold an annual two day meeting where all the trainees present their research progress and we discuss our research plans for the next year.  This year we met in Doug’s backyard, at the Vale Centre for Living Lakes in Sudbury.  Next year, we will head to Regina!

What is amazing to me about this collaboration is the cross training our students get.  We talk about development, growth, morphology, cellular responses to stress.  We have lab and field based research.  We have two species.  We focus on temperature, chemicals and radiation.  And when we get through the effects work, we switch gears and talk about the populations of fish we study – the habitats they use and their genetics.  It is a great environment for students.

On top of all that great science, we also have a lot of fun together.  Annual meeting is a chance for out students to hang out, with us and on their own.  I believe science collaborations work best when you really like hanging out together.  And this crew?  They are awesome.  Go Team Whitefish!

Lana Shaya, PhD candidate in WilsonToxLab, Drs. Rosa da Silva, Joanna Wilson, Juliet Daniel, and Robin Cameron at WOD Hamilton Awards

Last night, Hamilton held the 2015 YWCA Women of Distinction Awards and I won in the Sciences, Trades and Technology category.  It was totally overwhelming and I feel so grateful to be chosen among some really awesome and inspiring women researchers.  On top of that, the award category was sponsored by McMaster University and so I was presented with my award by Dr. Allison Sekuler, the AVP and Dean of Grad Studies, and a professor in Psychology, Neurosciences and Behaviour, where I am an Associate Member. It was so nice to receive this award from a female researcher that I greatly admire.

I didn’t do a long list of thank you’s in my speech, deciding instead to talk about the lack of recognition of women in STEM fields. The news this week that two leading female researchers resigned from the selection committee for the Hall of Fame at the Canadian Museum of Science and Technology was foremost in my mind.  Two years running and not a single female nominee?  Just ponder that a moment.  The researchers in question have made suggestions for how the process can be changed to encourage female nominees but changes do not appear to have been made.  Indeed, Dr. Judy Illes has been quoted in the CBC as saying “To have zero women two years in a row signifies a failure on our part to really reach out as needed.”  I thank her for these words, for she is correct, we need to urge institutions to be inclusive.   I find it troubling that the museum seems to think that the root cause is too few women in STEM.  I disagree with this idea and firmly believe that if there are women in STEM, there are excellent women to be recognized.

I would like to thank my nominator and colleague, Dr. Robin Cameron, and those that submitted support letters for my nomination.  I appreciate that you spent time nominating me!  Above is a picture of me, with just a few of the amazing women in Biology who shared such a special evening with me!

I had the unusual experience of appearing as an intervenor at a public hearing.  This week many from the Whitefish Project were in Kincardine for a re-licencing hearing for a nuclear generating station.  I always hoped that the data we produced would be useful for setting public policy and could be applied to environmental assessments but this was the first time where our research has been directly relevant and timely to a regulatory decision process and required direct involvement in that process.  Clearly, it is one small piece of the enormous amount of information and data being considered by the Commissioners in this decision, but it is still there.  I think it is important that science informs public policy decisions and was happy to take part.  Participation has surely taught me many things, but foremost is the importance of developing the ability to communicate science to diverse stakeholders.

Science communication is a difficult and challenging thing.  We have technical expertise and are used to speaking to others with a similar knowledge base.  That means that when we speak to each other, scientists use their own language, a high technical language that is difficult for non-scientists to comprehend.  So what happens if you want others to use your data?  Learning to explain your data to people with different technical backgrounds really isn’t enough.  We need to learn how to communicate what we know and what we don’t know in clear and simple language and I can tell you this is not easy.

I will be reflecting on both the written submission, our oral presentation to the commission, and how we answered questions from the commissioners for some time.  I believe that as a researcher, I have much to learn about how to effectively communicate my research to those beyond my discipline and that practice and reflection about what worked and what didn’t is likely the only way to really improve.

I’m not sure that November and December on Lake Huron can be considered a good time to go fishing but that is when we head out for whitefish.  This past weekend, weather conditions were finally good enough for gill netting but good conditions they weren’t.  With the boat rocking and rolling, we were able to collect only a few ripe male and females to provide 50 000 embryos for the year’s experiments.  While this may seem like a lot, last year we  had 2 great days on the water giving us 250 000 embryos for the project.   Still, I am rather relieved we got anything at all this year.  With very consistent high winds and high waves, we really haven’t had safe conditions to fish and I was fearing there would be no Lake Whitefish this year.

Sadly, there were no round whitefish collected this year in Lake Huron and we have hit the end of good weather and spawning season for that species.  Our last hope for round whitefish are from Lake Ontario, where spawning continues much later.  Here is hoping that their run has just started and that weather conditions on the lake are as good as can be expected as late fall/early winter allows.

In the meantime, here are a few photos of us and our fish!

John Eme and our favourite fish, the Lake Whitefish.

Shayen worked as a summer researcher in the Wilson Tox Lab but also volunteered last year as an undergraduate researcher.  He continues in the Wilson Tox Lab as a thesis student this year.  I think you can tell that we like having Shayen around.  In his own words, Shayen describes his summer and ongoing thesis research:

“I am entering my fourth year in the Honours Biology (Physiology Specialization) program and will be completing my undergraduate thesis in the lab. I have worked with Lake Whitefish, understanding the development and embryology of this species as well as studying the effects of environmental stressors from industrial processes on developmental physiology. I am also interested in understanding the effects of ionizing radiation and exposure of morpholine, a chemical present in effluents, on Great Lake fish species. I will be using a fish cell line to study effects at a cellular level as well as lake whitefish embryos for whole organism effects. My end points of interest include survival and growth, embryo morphology, the occurrence of apoptosis and chromosome damage.

Outside of the lab I am actively involved in various extra-curricular clubs on campus and volunteer commitments.”