Advisory Panel Member

David D. Eisenstat, M.D.

BTFC Advisory Panel Member 2005-Present

Dr. David Eisenstat’s laboratory, based at the Manitoba Institute of Cell Biology at CancerCare Manitoba, is interested in the interface between Cancer and Development. There is considerable evidence demonstrating that certain types of cancer result from failure of committed stem cells to properly develop into mature, differentiated tissues.

Dr. Eisenstat graduated from the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Medicine in 1985. Following an internship emphasizing surgery and a residency year in Anatomic Pathology at the University of Toronto, David completed his Pediatrics residency at the Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto in 1990. After a Clinical Fellowship in Pediatric Hematology-Oncology, also at the Hospital for Sick Children, he was awarded a Fellowship from the Pediatric Scientist Development Program. David moved his family to San Francisco, where he joined the Brain Tumor Research Center at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). In 1993, David began a second postdoctoral fellowship funded by the Medical Research Council of Canada with Dr. John Rubenstein, also at UCSF and was awarded a Master’s degree in Neuroscience from UCSF in 1997.

In 1998, David was a Clinical Fellow in Pediatric Neuro-Oncology at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. After over 13 years of post-medical school training, he began his first faculty appointment at the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada, in 1999. Since 2005, he is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics & Child Health, and holds full cross-appointments as an Associate Professor in the Departments of Human Anatomy & Cell Science and Ophthalmology, all at the University of Manitoba. In 2007, Dr. Eisenstat was appointed as the inaugural Director of the Advanced Degrees in Medicine Program of the Faculty of Medicine. This program currently includes oversight of the B.Sc. (Medicine) and MD/PhD programs and will incorporate participants of the Royal College of Physicians & Surgeons of Canada’s Clinician Investigator Program who are concurrently pursuing advanced degrees.

David is also Director of Neuro-Oncology for CancerCare Manitoba, a Senior Investigator of the Manitoba Institute of Cell Biology, director of the Graduate Neuroscience course and co-director of the Graduate Developmental Biology course and is a Scientist with the Manitoba Institute of Child Health. He is especially proud to have been awarded the Health Sciences Graduate Students Association Distinction in Mentorship Award in 2006.

Dr. Eisenstat’s research is currently funded by the Children’s Hospital Foundation of Manitoba, the CancerCare Manitoba Foundation, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Health Sciences Centre Foundation and the National Cancer Institute of Canada.