Yen Tran

Yen Tran

Yen Tran is a MSc student in Dr. Carole Yauk’s genomics laboratory at Health Canada. Yen obtained her Honours BSc in Biochemistry from the University of Ottawa. From her undergraduate COOP at Health Canada in both environmental toxicology research and a chemical regulatory bureau, Yen found interests in toxicological testing methods.

This led to her research on approaches to testing environmental chemicals having minimal toxicological data for genotoxicity in a cost-effective, rapid, and reliable manner. Her BSc research worked with in vitro standard assays (e.g. the micronucleus assay for chromosome damage) and novel tools such as toxicogenomics gene expression profiles to identify whether the chemicals were genotoxic. Her MSc research focuses on generating the toxicogenomics profiles and benchmark doses for potency assessment. Ultimately, her findings will pinpoint which chemicals and how much of the chemical will induce genetic damage, or in other words, her research will provide quantitative high-throughput toxicological data to support risk assessment of environmental chemicals in Canada.