Tania Bubela

My research program focuses on three main areas in health and biotechnology law and policy:

• Knowledge translation in health, biotechnology and new technologies in biomedicine. This area of research explores how health and biotechnology research is represented by the research community, industry, politicians, policy makers, the popular media, internet sites and other public venues. My research compares the translational layers between these stakeholder groups using a combination of qualitative (key informant interviews and focus groups) and quantitative research methods (lexicographic analysis, text coding, and statistical modelling).
• Impacts of commercialisation/open science and intellectual property policies on scientific culture as well as knowledge and technology flows in health biotechnology. We have developed a range of novel bibliometric and scientometric methods to address policy questions. We use these in combination with more traditional methods such as survey instruments, key informant interviews, social network analysis, and statistical modelling.
• Use of commons theory to analyse the institutional development of bioresource and data repositories for biomedical research. This research also addresses access and benefit sharing and research partnerships between developed and developing countries.

Degrees

JD, University of Alberta, 2003
PhD, University of Sydney, 1995
BSc (Hons), Australian National University, 1989

Awards

The Horace Harvey (Gold) Medal in Law Faculty of Law, University of Alberta
The Sheldon M Chumir Memorial Essay Prize in Human Rights, Sheldon M Chumir Foundation
Blake, Cassels and Graydon Second Year Scholarship , Blake, Cassels and Graydon LLP

Selected Publications

Bubela T, Gold ER, Graff GD, Cahoy DR, Nicol D, Castle D. Patent Landscaping for Life Sciences Innovation: Toward Consistent and Transparent Practices. Nature Biotechnology (in press, March 2013). [Impact Factor 23.268]

Bubela T, Gold ER (eds) Genetic Resources and Traditional Knowledge: Case Studies and Conflicting Interests. (Williston, VT: Edward Elgar, 2012).

Bubela T, Li MD, Hafez M, Bieber M, Atkins H. (2012) Is Belief Larger than Fact: Expectations, optimism and reality for translational stem cell research. BMC Medicine 10:133 (6 November 2012). [Impact Factor 6.035]

Bubela T, FitzGerald GA, Gold ER (2012) Recalibrating Intellectual Property Rights to Enhance Translational Research Collaborations. 4 Science Translational Medicine 122cm3. [Impact Factor 7.804]

Bubela T, Hagen G, Einsiedel E (2012) Synthetic biology confronts publics and policy makers: challenges for communication, regulation and commercialization. 30 (3) Trends in Biotechnology 132-137 [Impact Factor: 9.644].

Bubela T, Strotmann A, Noble R, Morrison S (2010) Commercialization and Collaboration: Competing Policies in Publicly-Funded Stem Cell Research? 7 Cell Stem Cell 21-30 [Impact Factor: 26.967].

Bubela T, Caulfield T (2010) Role and Reality: Technology Transfer at Canadian Universities. 28 Trends in Biotechnology 447-451 [Impact Factor: 9.644]

Schofield, PN, Bubela T, et al. (2009) Post-publication sharing of data and tools. 461 Nature 171-173. [Impact Factor: 36.280]

Bubela T, Nisbet, M, et al. (2009) Science Communication Reconsidered: Challenges, Prospects, and Recommendations. 27 Nature Biotechnology 514-518. [Impact Factor: 23.268]

Current Projects

PACE-'Omics: Personalized, accessible, cost-effective applications of 'Omics technologies
Co-lead investigator
funded by Genome Canada, Genome Alberta, Genome Quebec and Alberta Innovates Health Solutions

An Intellectual Property Index: Creating a firm foundation for transdisciplinary study, policy-making and business strategy
Co-Applicant
funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)

Source: Alberta Innovates Health Solutions – CRIO Team Grant
Alberta Ocular Gene Therapy Team
Co-Lead
funded by Alberta Innovates - Health Solutions CRIO Team Grant

Leading Clinical Trials in Islet and Stem Cell Transplantation, Restoration of Self-tolerance and Beta Cell Regeneration - Solving the Supply and Survival Problem in Type 1 Diabetes
Collaborative Member
funded by Alberta Innovates - Health Solutions CRIO Team Grant

Enhancing translational stem cell research: Innovative models for multi-sectoral collaboration
Principal investigator
Strategic Core Grant from the Stem Cell Network: Public Policy & ELSI Research in the Stem Cell Field

NorCOMM2 - In vivo models for human disease & drug discovery
Co-investigator
funded by Genome Canada and the Ontario Genomics Institute

International barcode of life project
Co-investigator
funded by Genome Canada and the Ontario Genomics Institute

Choroideremia: Expanding our understanding, exploring treatments
Co-investigator
funded by Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Foundation Fighting Blindness, Choroideremia Research Foundation, Canada

Biosystems for the production of high-value plant metabolites
Co-investigator
funded by Genome Canada and Genome Alberta

Tania Bubela
Associate Professor

Department of Public Health Sciences
3-279 Edmonton Clinic Health Academy
Phone: 780.492.9335
Fax: 780.248.0364
tania.bubela@ualberta.ca

Supervision

Currently accepting MSc and PhD students, and postdoctoral fellows

Teaching

PHS 606 - Health Law and Administration
PHS 603 - Scientific Communication in Public Health

Keywords

bioethics
biotechnology law
health law and policy
intellectual property
knowledge transfer
technology transfer and commercialization

Links

Dr. Bubela's lab website

Additional Publications