Members of the UNBC research team studying cancer fighting properties in mushrooms. Back row: Michael Van Dijk and Ankush Barad. Middle row: Dr. Hugues Massicotte, Linda Tackaberry, Faran Rashid, Vicky Myhre, and Aaron Smith. Front row: Dr. Chow Lee, Dr. Keith Egger, Sumreen Javed, and Dr. Kerry Reimer – photo courtesy UNBC

Prince George, B.C. – A UNBC undergraduate student has won a prestigious two-year studentship from the Brain Tumour Foundation of Canada to study brain cancer.

Faran Rashid was just one of five students across Canada, and the first from UNBC, to win the $10,000 award.

“It was pretty overwhelming,” he says. “I mean when I first applied I wasn’t exactly sure if I’d get it but when I did get that confirmation I was really happy.”

Rashid began working with mushrooms over the past year as part of an independent study.

With the assistance of supervisor Dr. Chow Lee, he applied for the studentship to look specifically at whether mushroom compounds can kill cancer cells.

He will conduct his research over the summer of 2015 and 2016, examining mushrooms that are native to northern British Columbia.

“My part of the project focuses on extracting compounds from these mushrooms in different fractions,” says Rashid. “And then once we do find anti-cancer activity we try to isolate which one of the compounds is actually causing that activity in the first place.”

Rashid will continue his undergraduate degree in Biochemistry in the fall and is applying to medical school.