The Blencowe lab focuses on mechanisms regulating precursor-mRNA processing in mammalian cells and how these mechanisms are altered in human diseases (including cancer).  The group is particularly interested in determining how alternative splicing is regulated and how splicing is coupled and synchronized with other stages in gene expression. The research group develops a variety of biochemical, molecular and cell biological protocols combined with newly developed computational methods to better understand RNA splicing.

Further more, Dr. Blencowe and his colleagues have pioneered the development and application of large-scale profiling tools for surveying alternative splicing, including a quantitative alternative splicing microarray profiling system, and one of the first pipelines analyzing high-throughput RNA sequencing data. This technology helped reveal among the first insights into the global regulatory properties of alternative splicing, including the existence of functionally coordinated exon networks and the observation that almost all human precursor mRNA transcripts are subject to alternative splicing.

Dr. Blencowe obtained his BSc Hons in Microbiology at Imperial College, University of London (UK) in 1988. He then earned his Ph.D. in Biochemistry at European Molecular Biology Laboratory (Heidelberg) and University of London (UK) in 1991. Dr. Blencowe completed his Postdoc and Internship at the Center for Cancer Research, M.I.T, in Cambridge, USA in 1998.He is currently a Professor in the Banting and Best Department of Medical Research and Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto. He is also a member of The Donnelly Centre, a multidisciplinary research institute based at the University of Toronto.

Dr. Blencowe is internationally recognized for his work on splicing regulation and was among the first to identify and characterize mammalian SR-related protein splicing regulators. He has also provided many approaches into how factors regulate and couple splicing with other steps in gene expression. He has co-led a recent effort to elucidate the RNA splicing code and the work was published in and featured on the cover of Nature in May 2010.