Karolina recently attended the ISSCR 2026 Annual Meeting in Montréal, where she presented our work in the session “Aging Models and Age-Related Diseases.” Her talk, “Directly Reprogrammed Human Neurons and Astrocytes Reveal Cell-Type-Specific Autophagy Dysregulation with Aging,” highlighted how direct reprogramming can preserve donor aging features and provide human cellular models for studying brain aging and neurodegeneration. The meeting was also a wonderful opportunity to reconnect with long-standing collaborators, including Roger Barker, Malin Parmar, and Janelle Drouin-Ouellet. Beyond the conference, there was also time to experience Montréal: including the historic WNBA game between the Toronto Tempo and Dallas Wings, which attracted 20,996 spectators and set a new regular-season attendance record. It was an inspiring week filled with excellent science, valuable discussions, longstanding collaborations, and memorable experiences.
