About Us
The Advani Lab’s mission is to improve the lives of people with diabetes now and in the future.
Diabetes happens when the sugar levels in your blood are too high. When the sugar levels in your blood are too high for too long this can cause long-term health problems like kidney disease and heart disease. These long-term health problems are called diabetes complications.
Our Objective
Our objective is to improve the lives of people with diabetes, now and in the future. To achieve this objective, our research program has three strands:
Investigating the causes of kidney disease in diabetes, with a focus on epigenetic processes, inflammation, chronic kidney disease and acute kidney injury.
Exploring the causes of heart failure, especially heart failure in diabetes, focusing on understanding how inflammation affects heart function.
Understanding the lived experience of those with diabetes, and exploring how people with diabetes can partner with their healthcare organization to improve diabetes care.
Research Interests
Our discovery research focuses on the causes of kidney disease and heart disease, especially kidney disease and heart disease in diabetes. 
Lab Members
Dita Chamoun
Research Coordinator III
Suzanne Advani
Research Technician II
Lisa Hong
Graduate Student
Youan Liu
Research Technician IV
Sri Batchu
Senior Research Associate
Duc Tin Tran
Post-Doctoral Fellow
Syeda Madiha Zahra
Post-Doctoral Fellow
Andrew Advani
Principal Investigator
News
24th January 2026
Congratulations to Dr. Madiha Zahra Syeda on her first-authored paper investigating the role of STING in kidney inflammation.
20th November 2025
Congratulations of Emily Yeung on her first-authored paper examining the effects of adenosine A2a receptor antagonism in obstructive uropathy.
19th July 2025
Thank you to the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) for awarding our team a new 5-year project grant to study the causes of kidney disease in diabetes.
6th June 2025
Sincere congratulations to Emily Yeung on successfully defending her master’s thesis. We wish Emily all the very best for the fall when she heads off to Trinity College Dublin to start medical school.
10th May 2025
We are grateful to the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada for providing us a new 4-year Grant-in-Aid to study how inflammation causes heart failure.
24th November 2024
Congratulations to Dr. Duc Tin Tran on the publication of his first-authored paper looking at the effect of finerenone on incretin hormone receptor expression in diabetic kidney disease.
1st November 2024
Congratulations to Emily Yeung on presenting her abstract on kidney inflammation at the 2024 American Society of Nephrology Kidney Week.
1st July 2024
We are grateful to have received new grant funding from the Kidney Foundation of Canada to explore the potential of repurposing a medication for the treatment of kidney scarring.
24th June 2024
Congratulations to Dr. Duc Tin Tran on presenting his abstract on the actions of finerenone in diabetic kidney disease at the 2024 Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association.
22nd June 2024
Congratulations to Lisa Hong on presenting her abstract on the epigenetics of diabetic kidney disease at the 2024 Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association.
10th June 2024
Congratulations to Lisa Hong on being awarded a BBDC – Novo Nordisk studentship from the Banting and Best Diabetes Centre.
10th June 2024
Congratulations to Emily Yeung on receiving a BBDC – Novo Nordisk studentship from the Banting and Best Diabetes Centre.
30th April 2024
Congratulations to Dr. Syeda Madiha Zahra on receiving a 3-year CIHR Fellowship.
30th April 2024
Congratulations to Lisa Hong on being awarded an Angels Den PhD Scholarship from the St. Michael’s Hospital Foundation.
23rd April 2024
Congratulations to Dr. Duc Tin Tran on being awarded a Novo Nordisk – BBDC Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Banting and Best Diabetes Centre.