Diallo Lab

Diallo Lab

Jean-Simon Diallo profile picture

Contact Information

Jean-Simon Diallo
613-737-8899 x 75203
jsdiallo@ohri.ca

Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
Centre for Cancer Therapeutics
501 Smyth Road
Box 926
Ottawa, ON
K1H 8L6

ORCID logo https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4862-2795

What We Do


Our research team is dedicated to exploring and advancing the field of "viral sensitizer" drugs, which enhance cellular susceptibility to viral medicines. Our primary objective is to leverage these innovative drugs for a wide range of virus-based therapeutic applications, such as cancer and gene therapy, and to enhance vaccine biomanufacturing methods.

Selected Publications

Taha Z, Crupi MJF, Alluqmani N, MacKenzie D, Vallati S, Whelan JT, Fareez F, Alwithenani A, Petryk J, Chen A, Spinelli MM, Ng K, Sobh J, de Souza CT, Bharadwa PR, Lee TKH, Thomas DA, Huang BZ, Kassas O, Poutou J, Gilchrist VH, Boulton S, Thomson M, Marius R, Hooshyar M, McComb S, Arulanandam R, Ilkow CS, Bell JC, Diallo JS. Complementary dual-virus strategy drives synthetic target and cognate T-cell engager expression for endogenous-antigen agnostic immunotherapy. Nat Commun. 2024 Aug 23;15(1):7267.

Jirovec A, Flaman A, Godbout E, Serrano D, Werier J, Purgina B, Diallo JS. Immune profiling of dedifferentiated liposarcoma and identification of novel antigens for targeted immunotherapy. Sci Rep. 2024 May 16;14(1):11254.

Alwithenani A, Taha Z, Thomson M, Chen A, Wong B, Arulanandam R, Diallo JS. Unlocking the potential of dimethyl fumarate: enhancing oncolytic HSV-1 efficacy for wider cancer applications. Front Immunol. 2023 Dec 19;14:1332929.

Wong B, Bergeron A, Maznyi G, Ng K, Jirovec A, Birdi HK, Serrano D, Spinelli M, Thomson M, Taha Z, Alwithenani A, Chen A, Lorimer I, Vanderhyden B, Arulanandam R, Diallo JS. Pevonedistat, a first-in-class NEDD8-activating enzyme inhibitor, sensitizes cancer cells to VSVΔ51 oncolytic virotherapy, Mol Ther, 2023 Sep 27: S1525-0016(23)00504-X.

Taha Z, Arulanandam R, Maznyi G, Godbout E, Carter-Timofte ME, Kurmasheva N, Reinert LS, Chen A, Crupi MJF, Boulton S, Laroche G, Phan A, Rezaei R, Alluqmani N, Jirovec A, Acal A, Fekete EEF, Singaravelu R, Petryk J, Idorn M, Potts KG, Todesco H, John C, Mahoney DJ, Ilkow CS, Giguère P, Alain T, Côté M, Paludan SR, Olagnier D, Bell JC, Azad T, Diallo JS. Identification of FDA-approved bifonazole as a SARS-CoV-2 blocking agent following a bioreporter drug screen, Mol Ther, 2022 Sep 7;30(9):2998-3016.

Arulanandam R, Taha Z, Garcia V, Selman M, Chen A, Varette O, Jirovec A, Sutherland K, Macdonald E, Tzelepis F, Birdi H, Alluqmani N, Landry A, Bergeron A, Vanderhyden B, Diallo JS. The strategic combination of trastuzumab emtansine with oncolytic rhabdoviruses leads to therapeutic synergy. Commun Biol. 2020 May 22;3(1):254.

Meet the Diallo Lab

Our research team is dedicated to exploring and advancing the field of "viral sensitizer" drugs, which enhance cellular susceptibility to viruses. Our primary objective is to leverage these innovative drugs for a wide range of virus-based therapeutic applications, such as cancer and gene therapy, and to enhance vaccine production methods.