Cassis Varlow

Scientific interests

My PhD focused on radiotracer development for imaging neurodegenerative pathology in chronic traumatic encephalopathy through in vitro characterization. My postdoc at NRU will be focused on imaging the BDNF/TrkB pathway and studying the effects of psychedelics on brain neuroplasticity.

Biography

Publications

Lindberg, A.; Chassé, M.; Varlow, C.; Pees, A.; Vasdev, N. Strategies for designing novel positron emission tomography (PET) radiotracers to cross the blood–brain barrier. Journal of Labelled Compounds and Radiopharmaceuticals. 2023; 1- 17. https://doi.org/10.1002/jlcr.4019. PubMed PMID: 36815704.

Varlow, C.; Vasdev, N. Evaluation of Tau Radiotracers in Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. Journal of Nuclear Medicine. 2023. 64(3).  https://doi.org/10.2967/jnumed.122.264404. PubMed PMID: 36109185.

Knight, A.C.; Morrone, C.D.; Varlow, C.; Yu, W. H.; McQuade, P.; Vasdev, N. Head-to-Head Comparison of Tau-PET Radioligands for Imaging TDP-43 in Post-Mortem ALS Brain. Molecular Imaging and Biology. 2022. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11307-022-01779-1. PubMed PMID: 36258099.

Poluga, C.; Varlow, C.; Vasdev, N.; Boileau, I. and Best, L. M. Chapter 3 - Physiology of the endocannabinoid system: Imaging and the use of positron emission tomography (PET). In Neurobiology and Physiology of the Endocannabinoid System. 2023. Patel, V. B., Preedy, V. R., Martin, C. R. Eds.; Academic Press; 35-51. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-323-90877-1.00011-5.

Varlow, C.; Knight, A. C.; McQuade, P.; Vasdev, N. Characterization of Neuroinflammatory PET Biomarkers in Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. Brain Communications. 2022, 4(1); fcac019, https://doi.org/10.1093/braincomms/fcac019. PubMed PMID: 35198978.

Knight, A. C.; Varlow, C.; Tong, J.; Vasdev, N. In vitro and In Vivo Evaluation of GSK-3 Radioligands in Alzheimer’s Disease: Preliminary Evidence of Sex Differences. ACS Pharmacology and Translational Science. 2021, 4(4); 1287-1294. https://doi.org/10.1021/acsptsci.1c00132. PubMed PMID: 34423266.

Knight, A. C.; Varlow, C.; Zi, T.; Liang, S. H.; Josephson, L.; Schmidt, K.; Patel, S.; Vasdev, N. In vitro Evaluation of [³H]CPPC as a Tool Radioligand for CSF-1R. ACS Chemical Neuroscience. 2021, 12(6); 998-1006. https://doi.org/10.1021/acschemneuro.0c00802. PubMed PMID 33667059.

Varlow, C.; Mossine, A. V.; Bernard-Gauthier, V.; Scott, P. H. J.; Vasdev, N. Radiofluorination of oxazole-carboxamides for preclinical PET neuroimaging of GSK-3. Journal of Fluorine Chemistry. 2021, 245. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfluchem.2021.109760. PubMed PMID: 33840834.

Hou, L.; Rong, J.; Haider, A.; Ogasawara, D.; Varlow, C., … Liang, S. H.. Positron Emission Tomography Imaging of the Endocannabinoid System: Opportunities and Challenges in Radiotracer Development. Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. 2021, 64(1); 123–149. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jmedchem.0c01459. PubMed PMID: 33379862.

Varlow, C., Boileau, I.; Wey, H.-Y.; Liang, S. H.; Vasdev, N. Classics in Neuroimaging: Imaging the Endocannabinoid Pathway with PET. ACS Chemical Neuroscience. 2020, 11(13); 1855-1862. https://doi.org/10.1021/acschemneuro.0c00305. PubMed PMID: 32559067.

Varlow, C.; Murrell, M.; Holland, J. P.; Kassenbrock, A.; Shannon, W.; Liang, S. H.; Vasdev, N.; Stephenson, N. A. Revisiting the Radiosynthesis of [¹⁸F]FPEB and Preliminary PET Imaging in a Mouse Model of Alzheimer’s Disease. Molecules. 2020, 25, 982. https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules25040982. PubMed PMID: 32098347.

Bernard-Gauthier, V.; Mossine, A.V.; Knight, A.; … Varlow, C.; …Vasdev, N. Structural Basis for Achieving GSK-3b Inhibition with High Potency, Selectivity and Brain Exposure for Positron Emission Tomography Imaging and Drug Discovery. Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. 2019, 62(21); 9600-9617. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jmedchem.9b01030. PubMed PMID: 31535859.

Varlow, C.; Szames, D.; Dahl, K.; Bernard-Gauthier, V.; Vasdev, N. Fluorine-18: an untapped resource in inorganic chemistry. Chemical Communications. 2018, 54; 11835-11842. https://doi.org/10.1039/C8CC04751K. PubMed PMID: 30191929.

Naperstkow, Z.; Moore, K.; Szames, D.; Varlow, C.; Armstrong, A. F.; Galea, R. Production and standardization of an on-demand protactinium-233 tracer. Journal of Radioanalytical and Nuclear Chemistry. 2018, 318(1); 703-709. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-018-6068-x.

Awards

2023 - Rainwater Charitable Foundation Tau Consortium Fellowship; Boston, Massachusetts

2022 - Rainwater Charitable Foundation Tau Consortium Fellowship; Irving, Texas

2022 - Brain Imaging Council First Place Young Investigator Award

• Cassis Varlow and Neil Vasdev. “Evaluation of Tau Radiotracers in Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy”. Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging Annual Meeting, Vancouver 2022. 

2022 - Berson-Yalow Award – Radiopharmaceutical Sciences Council at the SNMMI

• Cassis Varlow and Neil Vasdev. “Evaluation of Tau Radiotracers in Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy”. Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging Annual Meeting, Vancouver 2022. 

2022 - Rainwater Charitable Foundation Tau Consortium Fellowship

2021-2024 - Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarship – Doctoral – Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)

2021 - Berson-Yalow Award – Radiopharmaceutical Sciences Council at the SNMMI

• Ashley C. Knight, Cassis Varlow, Tong Zi, Steven H. Liang, Lee Josephson, Karl Schmidt, Shil Patel and Neil Vasdev. “In vitro evaluation of [³H]CPPC for imaging CSF-1R”. Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging Annual Meeting, Virtual due to Covid-19; 2021. 

2021 - Rainwater Charitable Foundation Tau Consortium Fellowship

2020 - Rainwater Charitable Foundation Tau Consortium Fellowship