 |
U of S gets first seven Canada Research Chairs
 |
| Prof. Lorne Babiuk |
 |
| Prof. Louis Delbaere |
 |
| Prof. Akira Hirose |
 |
| Prof. Jim Miller |
The U of S will get its first seven Canada Research Chairs (CRC) and $1.1 million in annual CRC funding from the federal government, Industry Minister Brian Tobin announced April 25 in Winnipeg.
"This is excellent news for the University of Saskatchewan," President Peter MacKinnon said. "The money will play an important role in strengthening the University’s position as a major centre for research excellence."
Five of the Chair-holders are from the U of S working in the Colleges of Agriculture, Engineering, Medicine and Veterinary Medicine, and the History Dept. The other two are from the Dept. of Geography at Queen’s University and from the Dept. of Sociology at the University of Singapore.
The Chairs will focus on the University’s six main areas of research: biotechnology, environmental sciences, health sciences, identity and diversity, materials science, and technology and change.
"There will be a tremendous infusion of academic creativity. We intend to build on our deployment of Canada Research Chairs to recruit tenure-track faculty in the areas of research identified in the strategic research plan for the Chairs program," MacKinnon said.
The Chairs are the first of 31 allotted to the U of S by the Canada Research Chairs Program, a $900-million initiative of the federal government designed to create 2,000 new research chairs at Canadian universities over the next five years.
Nominations are submitted by universities to the Chairs Program and are reviewed by academic peers who choose only the most outstanding. The Program offers Tier 1 chairs (a seven-year term for world leaders in their field, renewable, bringing $200,000 per year to the University) and Tier 2 chairs (a five-year term for researchers with peer-acknowledged potential to become world leaders, renewable once, bringing $100,000 per year).
The Chairs fall into the fields of the three main federal granting agencies: the Natural Sciences & Engineering Research Council (NSERC); the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR); and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).
The Chairs should begin their work by Jan. 1, 2002. They are:
- $1.4M over seven years (renewable) for a CIHR Chair in Vaccinology for VIDO Director Lorne Babiuk.
- $1.4M over seven years (renewable) for a CIHR Chair in Structural Biochemistry. for Louis Delbaere, Dept. of Biochemistry, College of Medicine.
- $1.4M over seven years (renewable) for a SSHRC Chair in Native-newcomer Relations. Chair holder, James Miller, Dept. of History, College of Arts and Science.
- $0.5M over five years (renewable once) for a SSHRC Chair in Identity and Diversity: the Aboriginal Experience. Chair holder, Evelyn Peters, Associate Professor, Department of Geography, Queen’s University.
- $0.5M over five years (renewable once) for a SSHRC Chair in Science, Technology and Social Change. Chair holder, Zaheer Baber, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Sociology, National University of Singapore.
- $1.4M over seven years (renewable) for an NSERC Chair in Plasma Science. Chair holder, Akira Hirose, Head of Physics and Engineering Physics, College of Arts and Science.
- $0.5M over five years (renewable once) for an NSERC Chair in Bio-energy and Environmentally-friendly Chemical Processing, Chair holder, Ajay Dalai, Associate Professor, Department of Chemical Engineering, College of Engineering.
Profs. Babiuk, Delbaere, Hirose and Miller are Tier 1 Chairs, while Baber, Dalai and Peters are Tier 2.
In concert with the Canadian Light Source synchrotron and the recruitment of about 150 new faculty over the next three years, the U of S sees the incoming Chairs as a way to help bolster research excellence on campus.
 |
 |
