Marco Marra

Marco Marra OC OBC
Born	(1966-06-30) June 30, 1966 Berwyn, Alberta, Canada
Education	Simon Fraser University (PhD – Genetics, BSc – Molecular & Cell Biology)
Known for	Genomics, Bioinformatics, Cancer Biology, Genetics, Epigenomics, Personalized OncoGenomics (POG)
Title	Director, Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre, BC Cancer Distinguished Scientist, BC Cancer Research Institute, BC Cancer Professor, Department of Medical Genetics, University of British Columbia
Website	www.bcgsc.ca

Marco Antonio Marra is a Distinguished Scientist and Director of Canada's Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre at the BC Cancer Research Centre and Professor of Medical Genetics at the University of British Columbia (UBC). He also serves as UBC Canada Research Chair in Genome Science for the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and is an inductee in the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame.

Education and Early Life

Canadian born and educated, Dr. Marco Marra received a B.Sc. in Molecular & Cell Biology and a PhD in Genetics from Simon Fraser University. The title of his PhD thesis: “Genome analysis in Caenorhabditis elegans: Genetic and molecular identification of genes tightly linked to unc-22(IV)”.

Marra trained as a post-doctoral fellow at the Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, Missouri. He went on to become Group Leader of both the EST (Express Sequence Tag) Sequencing Team and Genome Fingerprinting and Mapping Teams at Washington University in St. Louis’s Genome Sequence Center (renamed the McDonnell Genome Institute).

Career and Research

During his first two years with British Columbia’s Genome Sequence Center (renamed Canada's Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre), Marra served as head of the Mapping and Sequencing teams, Associate Director and Scientific Co-Director. He also held the position of Senior Scientist at BC Cancer Research and Adjunct Professor for the Department of Medical Genetics. Marra subsequently became Professor and Head of the Department of Medical Genetics in the Faculty of Medicine at UBC.

From 2011 to 2018, Marra founded and co-directed the Genome Science and Technology Graduate Program at UBC. He also served as Adjunct Professor at the Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry at Simon Fraser University from 2001 to 2015. Marra took over as Director of Canada's Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre (GSC) when Dr. Smith died of cancer in 2000.

Human Genome Project

Along with GSC co-director, Dr. Steven J.M. Jones, Marra was instrumental in creating the first map the human genome, an international initiative that allowed the data to remain in the public domain.

The paper published in the 15 February 2001 issue of Nature, titled "A physical map of the human genome", describes the construction and use of the human genome map to fuel human genome sequencing. Marra made fundamental contributions to that effort by devising and then implementing clonal fingerprinting techniques that led to the construction and use of the map, which served as the centralized coordinating resource for the sequencing effort.

Coronavirus

Led by Marra, the GSC was first in the world to sequence the SARS virus in 2003. Using this information they were the first to identify SARS as a coronavirus. This discovery, along with knowledge of the SARS genome, had significant implications for many infectious diseases and vaccine development. Sequencing techniques used for SARs were also applied to many fields of research and discovery, including cancer.

In 2020, the GSC joined the Canadian COVID Genomics Network (CanCOGeN), a Genome Canada initiative to generate accessible and usable genomics data to inform COVID-19 public health decisions. The GSC was one of the first three facilities involved in sequencing 10,000 Canadians that tested positive for the virus (HostSeq) for this Government of Canada funded project. Research co-led by Marra also identified an alternative procedure for extracting nucleic acids for COVID-19 testing.

Precision Oncology

Personalized OncoGenomics

As part of a GSC initiative, Marra played a pivotal role in the first proof-of-concept for the effective use of whole genome analyses in personalized cancer medicine, leading to the development of BC Cancer’s Personalized OncoGenomics (POG) program. POG, co-led by Dr. Janessa Laskin, represents one of the first applications of whole genome sequencing in a clinical setting, using information derived from thousands of individual cancer genomes and transcriptomes to identify promising therapeutic targets in individual patients.

Marathon of Hope

In 2019, Marra and the POG team became a key part of the Marathon of Hope Cancer Centres Network. Led by the Terry Fox Research Institute and the Terry Fox Foundation, with support from dozens of research and funding partners across Canada, this represents the country’s largest ever clinical data-sharing initiative. The Marathon of Hope aims to accelerate the adoption of precision medicine for cancer patients throughout Canada.  

Marra continues to extend the reach of genomics toward managing and eradicating disease. His research has uncovered new cancer mutations, candidate biomarkers and therapeutic targets, and has been instrumental in demonstrating the functional interplay between the cancer genome and epigenome.

Awards and honours

Marra's contributions to genome science led to an honorary Doctor of Science degree from Simon Fraser University in 2004, and an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Calgary in 2005. He is also a recipient of the Order of British Columbia and became a member of the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame in 2020.

In 2024, he was appointed as an officer to the Order of Canada. He lives in Vancouver.