Kate was awarded the CIBC Scholarship 2024-2025.
Kate Friesen is a final year doctoral candidate in the Department of Oncology at the University of Oxford. Her research focuses on engineering novel oncolytic viruses for the treatment of solid tumours.
Oncolytic virotherapy (OV) is a promising targeted cancer treatment where oncolytic viruses selectively infect and kill cancer cells. One of the current challenges with OV is the limited spread of viruses through solid tumours.
Kate is focusing her doctoral research on this challenge, researching an exosome targeting system whereby exosomes produced in situ by virus-infected cells carry biological cargo/therapeutics to surrounding tumour cells (exosomes are endogenous lipid-coated nanoparticles that transport cargo between cells). Specific cargo can induce cell death and encourage viral spread throughout the tumour or activate the immune system. Her work has the potential to contribute to revolutionising the field of cancer therapy by targeting therapies to tumours that are unresponsive to systemic treatments, thereby avoiding the off-target effects of other therapies.
Kate’s enthusiasm for biomedical sciences developed during her visits to family members in Winnipeg hospitals. Witnessing her family members struggle with cancer and the debilitating side effects of chemotherapy and radiation therapy was the driving force behind her decision to pursue further education in science.
Prior to beginning her doctoral studies, she earned an BSc (Hons) from the University of Toronto, majoring in Immunology and minoring in Physiology and Biology. Throughout her time at the University of Toronto, Kate became increasingly interested in immuno-oncology, and in 2018 and 2019, was awarded a Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Scholarship and a MITACS Globalink Research Internship Award to undertake a project investigating how Helicobacter pylori causes cancer at the Centre for Innate Immunity and Infectious Diseases at the Hudson Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne, Australia.
In 2020, Kate was awarded a prestigious Clarendon Scholarship, in partnership with Christ Church at the University of Oxford, to engineer novel targeted cancer therapeutics using oncolytic viruses and exosomes.
While attending the University of Oxford, Kate rowed for the Oxford University Boat Club, and competed on the Competitive Dance team. She was the Women’s Captain for Christ Church Boat Club, Social Secretary for the Clarendon Council, and a Welfare Officer for her college Graduate Common Room.
Kate’s future aspirations include pursuing a medical education with the goal of becoming a clinician-scientist focused on developing treatments for solid tumours. She is committed to enhancing the Canadian healthcare system’s overall quality and effectiveness.
