In the pre-pandemic world, summer was the height of wedding season. While it has been a challenging year with in-person celebrations either paused or postponed, life has not stopped. Similarly, critical research at the Weizmann Institute has not stopped. In response, Weizmann Canada launched The Lab Registry.

Just like a wedding registry, The Lab Registry provided a shopping list of items, but instead of items for one’s home, the items would support the labs of budding Weizmann scientists. Items ranged from a gold slide to image cancer biopsies (valued at $100) — for the lab of Dr. Leeat Keren of Department of Molecular Cell Biology, to the monthly cost of nutrients to grow cells (valued at $2,000) — for the lab of Dr. Moran Shalev-Benami from the Department of Chemical and Structural Biology.

Just over a half dozen testimonials from Weizmann scientists were shared about such everyday costs for scientific research. Funding buildings and mega machines is vital to science and so are the everyday, often unspoken costs of discovery. That’s what The Lab Registry was all about.

Inspired by this celebration of love for science, the Weizmann Canada community came together virtually to reach 100 per cent of The Lab Registry’s goal.

Canadian supporters Laurie and Jeff Cohen and Francie and Stuart Klein generously pledged $5K per couple in matching funds, which helped the community collectively raise $20,000.

This was a first of its kind initiative for our Canadian donor community and given the incredible response, it is set to become a yearly program.

Particularly at a time when pandemic uncertainty continues, Weizmann Canada gratefully acknowledges all those who put their hope for a better future in action by generously investing in enabling scientific discovery for the benefit of all.