Eight UBC Science researchers are part of a new round of funding that awarded a total of $2 million from two grant programs of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) to researchers at the University. More than 140 UBC students also received NSERC scholarships, fellowships and awards.
Twelve projects received a total of $1.44 million over three years from the Discovery Accelerator Supplements (DAS) program, which recognizes researchers who have the potential to become international leaders in their areas of study and aims to give them the opportunity to contribute to groundbreaking advances. The grants were part of an investment of $14.7 million for 123 grants announced today by Gary Goodyear, Minister of State (Science and Technology) at Brock University.
Laurel Schafer, an associate professor in the Department of Chemistry, will receive DAS funding for her work in green chemistry. She is investigating the use of a new family of catalysts that produces no by-products and minimizes energy consumption in the synthesis of useful chemical structures. The development of these catalysts aims to find sustainable methods to produce important chemical transformations for the fine chemical, petrochemical, pharmaceutical and agrochemical industries.
Other funded projects in the departments of Zoology, Mathematics, Statistics, Physics and Astronomy will delve into a range of areas, including quantum devices, molecular mechanisms, global seismology, growth and nutrition in fungi, and ecological filtering.
“UBC researchers work hard to find innovative solutions to complex scientific problems,” says John Hepburn, UBC Vice President Research and International. “We are grateful to NSERC and CIHR for their continued support for collaboration and interdisciplinary research.”
UBC Science Funded Projects
Becoming a fungus: comparative phylogenomic studies of evolution of hyphal growth and absorptive nutrition in fungi Mary Berbee, Professor, Botany
Physical state of the subducting Juan de Fuca plate and the blind deconvolution problem in global seismology Michael Bostock, Professor, Earth and Ocean Sciences
Advanced monte carlo methods for bayesian computation Arnaud Doucet, Associate Professor, Computer Science, Statistics
Quantum devices: engineering electronic coherence in nanostructures Joshua Folk, Associate Professor, Physics and Astronomy
Using viruses as tools to elucidate the molecular mechanisms for transport into the nucleus Nelly Panté, Professor, Zoology
The role of ecological filtering, dispersal limitation and species traits in determining food web structure and function Diane Srivastava, Associate Professor, Zoology
Quantization, frames and compressed sensing Ozgur Yilmaz, Associate Professor, Mathematics
More than 140 UBC students were also named recipients of the Alexander Graham Bell Canada Graduate Scholarships and NSERC Postgraduate Scholarships and Postdoctoral Fellowships Programs – ranging from $17,300 to $105,000 – at this morning’s announcement.
Last week, Minister Goodyear announced 34 grants totaling $15 million from NSERC’s Collaborative Health Research Projects program (CHRP). A partnership between NSERC and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), CHRP grants are designed to assist new projects that involve interdisciplinary collaborations between any field of the natural sciences or engineering and the health sciences. UBC was awarded more than $600,000 for five research projects.
UBC recently announced it received $4.9 million in funding from NSERC’s Collaborative Research and Training Experience (CREATE) program to help science and engineering students expand their professional and personal skills and prepare them for the workplace.
For more information, visit: http://www.publicaffairs.ubc.ca/2011/06/03/ubc-awarded-4-9-million-from…
For more information about the DAS program and recipients, visit: http://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/Media-Media/NewsRelease-CommuniqueDePresse…
For more information about the CHRP program and recipients, visit: http://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/Media-Media/NewsRelease-CommuniqueDePresse…
With files from Heather Amos, UBC Public Affairs
