Top honours awarded to biomedical sciences grads this spring

The Faculty of Science celebrated two outstanding students whose accomplishments earned them the top honours at this spring’s convocation. Biomedical sciences graduates Christian Denino and Jagatjot Singh Randhawa were awarded the TMU Gold Medal and Governor General’s Academic Silver Medal, respectively, in recognition of their community impact and academic standings.

We spoke to Denino about what this recognition means to him, his experience at TMU and what’s next for him after graduation.

What does receiving the TMU Gold Medal mean to you?

To me, the TMU Gold Medal is emblematic of the support that I was fortunate enough to receive during my undergraduate years. These supports, among other things, made the commitment of substantial time and effort to disciplined study not only logistically manageable, but genuinely enjoyable. Perhaps it borders on cliché to say that I could not have done it without the support of family and friends—but it happens to be true. This medal is as much mine as it is theirs. Thank you.

What has been your proudest accomplishment at TMU?

One of my proudest accomplishments at TMU was co-hosting the 2025 2SLGBTQ+ in STEM Conference alongside Dr. Imogen Coe. I met so many radiant and admirable people throughout the planning of this conference, and I was challenged immensely—conference orchestration is no minor feat—for which I am beyond grateful. The initial conference preparation began in May of 2024 for its run in June 2025; so, we spent over a year with it—first adapting it from its previous iteration(s), molding it, shaping it to have its own TMU flair, and then working to bring that vision to life. At times, it felt that the conference would both never arrive, and arrive too soon. But when June arrived, the event seemed to blink past, leaving me with the strange ambivalence of having to detach from something I’d grown deeply tethered to. Not unlike a parent waving their child off to university, the experience was bittersweet. The conference itself—and here I speak on behalf of the entire organizing committee— far outstripped our expectations. It was so gratifying to see other queer scientists from universities across Canada converging over a shared commitment to queering STEM. Throughout both the conference and its planning, I cultivated, and contributed to the cultivation of, connections that will undoubtedly last a lifetime. That’s definitely a proud moment for me.

What are your future plans? How has TMU prepared you for your future?

Next year, I will be entering the Philosophy MA program at TMU, where I will, in part, be thinking through the workings of philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, specifically looking at the sympathies and tensions that exist in their concept of the “axiomatic of capital”—whereby capitalism operates through flexible, expandable axioms—together with mathematical set theory. I believe that the biomedical sciences program at TMU has provided me—along with a solid appreciation of biomedical, mathematical, and physical concepts—a strong sense of interdisciplinarity that I will now apply to philosophical quandaries. While the content of these two programs is distinct, I have a sense that the skills honed throughout the biomedical sciences program transcend traditional disciplinary silos, allowing for a more generative triangulation of divergent fields that, to me, is essential for solving elusive social and scientific problems. For that, I am greatly indebted to TMU.