Jennifer Quizi
Director, Biotherapeutics Manufacturing Centre - Virus Manufacturing Facility
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
Investigator, Cancer Therapeutics Program
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
Director, Biotherapeutics Manufacturing Operations
BioCanRx
Research Interests
Brief Biography
Dr. Jennifer Quizi received her PhD in Cellular and Molecular Medicine from the University of Ottawa and has been working as part of a translational team in cancer therapy for more than 10 years. This includes working for a small, Ottawa-based startup oncology company, and subsequently working with the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute as Operations Manager and Program Manager for Dr. John Bell, and later Director of Scientific Affairs for the Network of Centres of Excellence, BioCanRx.
In November 2020, she was appointed the Director of the Virus Manufacturing Facility within the Biotherapeutics Manufacturing Centre at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, where she provides direction and sets strategic priorities as they apply to the development and GMP production of therapeutic viruses that are used in early phase clinical trials. She is part of national team of scientists and clinicians who have built a Canadian CAR-T cell platform known as the
Canadian Led Immunotherapies for Cancer, or CLIC, to provide access to this exciting new treatment to Canadian patients.
Dr. Quizi is an early career researcher, being recently appointed as an Investigator at OHRI. Since her appointment, she has been successful in securing significant grant funding in support of both biomanufacturing projects and specialized training initiatives. One such program is CanPRIME, a first-of-its kind training program that provides students with hands-on, real-world experience working in a GMP biomanufacturing environment.
She continues to support the mission and vision of BioCanRx, a federally funded Network of Centres of Excellence, where she holds the position of Director, Biotherapeutics Manufacturing Operations. In this position, she is responsible for enabling the national roll-out of a type of distributive manufacturing known as point-of-care, as well as working with facilities across Canada to build much needed, additional capacity in therapeutic virus biomanufacturing.
Selected Publications
1 - Natasha Kekre, Kevin Anthony Hay, John R Webb, Ranjeeta Mallick, Miruna Balasundaram, Mhairi K Sigrist, Anne-Marie Clement, Julie S Nielsen, Jennifer Quizi, Eric Yung, Scott D Brown, Lisa Dreolini, Daniel D Waller, Julian Smazynski, Nicole S Gierc, Bianca C Loveless, Kayla Clark, Tyler Dyer, Richard Hogg, Leah Mccormick, Michael Gignac, Shanti Bell, D Maria Chapman, David Bond, Siao Yong, Rachel Fung, Heather M Lockyer, Victoria Hodgson, Catherine Murphy, Ana Subramanian, Evelyn Wiebe, Piriya Yoganathan, Liana Medynski, Dominique C Vaillant, Alice Black, Sheryl Mcdiarmid, Michael Kennah, Linda Hamelin, Kevin Song, Sujaatha Narayanan, Judith A Rodrigo, Stefany Dupont, Terry Hawrysh, Justin Presseau, Kednapa Thavorn, Manoj Lalu, Dean A Fergusson, John Cameron Bell, Harold Atkins, Brad H Nelson and Robert Holt (2022) “ CLIC-01 Clinical Trial: Manufacture and Distribution of Non-Cryopreserved CAR-T Cells for Patients with CD19 Positive Hematologic Malignancies”
2 - Donald Bastin; Jennifer Quizi; Michael A Kennedy;?Rebecca?C Auer;?Natasha?Kekre (2022)
“Current Challenges in the Manufacture of Clinical Grade Autologous Whole Cell Vaccines for Hematologic Malignancies”. Cytotherapy. In Press
3 - Quizi, J and Megan Mahoney (2020) Canadian Science Policy Centre, 2020 Conference Editorial, “
CanPRIME- A Novel and Necessary Model for Integrated Training to Support Canada’s Biomanufacturing Ecosystem”.
Diseases, conditions and populations of interest
Research and clinical approaches
