2025-2026 Impact ReportWarming up the hunt for a cancer cure

For more than 100 years, doctors have chased a medical mystery: the story of a cancer patient reportedly cured after being bitten by a rabid dog. The theory was that the virus had killed the cancer, but early attempts to replicate this often involved infecting patients with dangerous pathogens like West Nile or hepatitis. Their tumours sometimes shrank, but the viruses caused more harm than the cancer itself.

Today, University of Alberta virologist Dr. Maya Shmulevitz is engineering a modern equivalent to those early, accidental successes using a harmless resident of the human gut called a reovirus. And her biggest leap forward came from a surprisingly low-tech solution: a buffet warming tray.

The fridge problem

For decades, global lab protocols required scientists to test how viruses attach to cells at 4 C, the temperature of a refrigerator. "It’s just the way it’s always been done," says Shmulevitz, a professor in the Department of Medical Microbiology & Immunology and Canada Research Chair in Molecular Virology and Immunotherapy.

By switching the testing temperature to 37 C — human body temperature — her team, based at the Li Ka Shing Institute for Virology, discovered they could see which viruses were actually the best hunters. To maintain that temperature in a cool, crowded lab was a logistical challenge, however, until a trainee with a background in food service suggested a clever, space-saving solution: a common buffet warming tray.

"It was surprising how much difference this made," Shmulevitz says. "If more researchers use the best physiological temperatures, we have achieved success in moving science forward."

Why now: From gut health to cancer cures

This breakthrough is the latest win for a research program partly powered by WCHRI — Shmulevitz previously used a WCHRI Innovation Grant to study oral vaccines and rapid diagnostics for childhood stomach bugs like rotavirus and norovirus.

That foundational work helped her secure a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) project grant in 2025, to optimize safe viruses for cancer therapy and better predict the behaviour of pathogens like flu and COVID-19. She also co-directs a large, multi-university team that secured $57 million in federal funding to build a vaccine development and biomanufacturing pipeline for rapid pandemic response.

What’s next: Mapping the viral hunt

Shmulevitz’s CIHR-funded research evaluates mammalian orthoreovirus, a virus type being developed to target malignant cells. These reoviruses are safe in humans, because the immune system typically catches them before they can harm healthy cells and tissues.

Her team is mapping how these viruses bind to specific sugars on cell surfaces called sialic acids. Surprisingly, their findings suggest that weaker binders might actually be better at spreading through tumours than stronger ones. Shmulevitz explains that if a virus grips the first cell it sees too tightly, it can’t travel far enough to treat the whole disease.

"It's like a scout getting stuck at the front gate," she says. "We want a weak binder so the scout can keep running through the whole fortress, opening as many windows as possible."

By mastering these molecular details, she hopes to pave the way for engineered variants that can spread deeper into tumours and alert the immune system to help clear the cancer.

"I do think that within the next decade, more and more examples of using viruses as cancer therapies will come out," she says. "You're never satisfied with 'oh, well, that's just the way it is.' You're always pushing."

Story by Don Bell
Photos and video by Katrina Grey