Current Chairholders

Natural language processing is a subfield of linguistics, computer science and artificial intelligence that aims to teach computers to understand and generate human language. Sustainable, equitable, socially responsible natural language processing machines can serve humans from diverse backgrounds and enable discoveries across a wide range of fields.

As Canada Research Chair in Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning, Dr. Muhammad Abdul-Mageed is studying computational “sociopragmatics”—awareness of the social conditions that govern language. He and his research team are trying to develop sociopragmatically intelligent models that have knowledge of time, space and social meaning, such as emotion, language variety, empathy and style. For example, they hope to develop a model that can detect a particular dialect and writing style and translate it into a different dialect or style. Ultimately, their work will inform our understanding of human behaviour, learning and history, and support social justice and sustainability.

Digital technologies are transforming health care tools, such as point-of-care ultrasound. Advances in machine learning offer enormous potential to improve diagnostic accuracy and outcomes for patients with help from these tools, but challenges remain: while portable ultrasound machines are widely available, there is a shortage of trained users, particularly in rural and remote areas. Machine learning can help—but only if it is trained on large, diverse datasets.

Dr. Purang Abolmaesumi, Canada Research Chair in Biomedical Engineering, is developing a robust machine learning framework that can adapt to users with varying levels of expertise and recognize unfamiliar inputs. He and his research team are advancing self-supervised learning, improving accuracy in noisy data environments, and estimating uncertainty in predictions. They are also designing artificial intelligence systems that can help interpret ultrasound images. Together, these innovations aim to support broader, more equitable access to high-quality diagnostic imaging in Canada and beyond.

Dr. Cash Ahenakew has spent his career searching for ways to understand how local knowledges and practices can inform the resurgence of Indigenous wisdom, knowledge, education, well-being and healing practices. As Canada Research Chair in Indigenous People’s Well-Being, he is focusing on decolonizing Indigenous mental health, transforming healthcare providers’ practices, and ensuring culturally appropriate eldercare.  

He and his research team are examining the influences of colonization and climate change on the mental health and well-being of Indigenous people. They are also exploring the responsibilities of physicians in interrupting colonialism and anti-Indigenous racism in the health-care sector. Ahenakew’s team is also working with seniors, Elders, practitioners and providers to explore how Indigenous seniors experience assisted living, adult daycare, long-term care, nursing homes, hospice care and home care. By integrating Indigenous healing practices and land-based orientations with contemplative practices and therapies, their research will contribute to healing and well-being for Indigenous people.

Ethics is a branch of philosophy that involves systematizing, defending and recommending concepts of right and wrong. Most religions have an ethical component. As Canada Research Chair in Theology and Ethics, Dr. Rumee Ahmed is pursuing two interrelated research projects-one focusing mainly on theology and the other on ethics.

In one project, Ahmed and his research team are examining archival material and studies to develop a revised narrative of Islamic and practical theology. In the other, they are working with an online platform to facilitate debate about moral rights and wrongs using the language of Islamic law. Ultimately, their work will inform scholarship where these two projects interact and lead to new avenues of research.

As our climate rapidly changes, a number of species are picking up and moving further towards the Earth’s poles, or to higher elevations. Many of Canada’s at-risk species are reaching their northern limits in southern Canada. These populations represent our best available sources of information on potential future shifts in animal and plant ranges.

Scientists have been unable to extensively predict which species will prove capable of migration, keeping pace with climate change; or whether those species unable to move will persist by adaptation. To forecast such range shifts, scientists must first understand why different species are distributed across landscapes the way they are.

To learn more about this, Dr. Amy L. Angert, Canada Research Chair in Conservation Ecology, is studying the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of species populations living at expanding and contracting range edges. She and her research team are investigating the importance of ecological factors, such as weather, dispersal and competition, at different range edges. They are also investigating how genetic variations—the raw material for evolutionary change—vary among populations across such ranges.

Angert’s work will lead to refined tools for modelling species distribution, providing key information for understanding the future of many animal and plant species. Ultimately, her research will help guide management and policy decisions concerning climate change adaptation and biodiversity preservation.

The Pacific shore, often framed and understood as Indigenous and Asian, is also a place that Black people call home and where Black knowledge abounds. As Canada Research Chair in Black Arts and Epistemologies, Dr. Phanuel Antwi is examining Blackness in relation with Asianness and Indigeneity, and their shared Pacific knowledges.

To investigate how multiple histories intersect in the region, Antwi and his research team are establishing the Studio for Racial and Colonial Tidalectics—an innovative laboratory for collaboration, artistic creation and critical encounter. The studio will be a place to explore what we know and how we come to know it through the body, particularly the racialized body. It will support a range of faculty, staff and students while facilitating meaningful engagement with local, national and international partners. Ultimately, the aim is to transform how we think about Pacific history, contemporary civic relationships, and Blackness in Canada.

Among Canadian women, breast cancer is the most common form of cancer (excluding non-melanoma skin cancers) and is the second-leading cause of death from cancer. Women are at higher risk of developing both breast and ovarian cancer if they have an inherited gene mutation. Dr. Samuel Aparicio, Canada Research Chair in Molecular Oncology and Therapeutics, is looking for ways to improve outcomes for patients who have-or are at risk of developing-breast and ovarian cancers.

Building on their recent insights into cancer evolution, Aparicio and his research team are trying to determine the mechanisms and consequences of genomic instability in triple-negative breast cancers and high-grade serous ovarian cancers. They are also using the information they uncover to identify and test new treatments for these high-risk cancers. Their discoveries may apply to other types of cancer as well.

The loss of biodiversity because of pressures from human activities is a growing global concern. Protecting habitat is an important conservation strategy, but its effectiveness is hindered by many challenges, including a perceived lack of information and studies linking habitat to the health of different species.

As Canada Research Chair in Statistical Ecology, Dr. Marie Auger-Méthé is developing models that identify critical habitat based on available information and pinpointing areas used by healthy and reproductive animals. She and her research team are also advancing the underlying statistical methodologies needed to ensure these tools are both effective and accurate. Ultimately, their research will help dismantle roadblocks to conservation in Canada and around the world.

Young people in Canada face numerous barriers, such as unemployment, homelessness and discrimination, when they are navigating mental health or substance use services—and only 25 to 30 per cent of those with mental health issues gain access to specialized treatments. By providing a single point of access to care, integrated youth services (IYS) have emerged as a way to address these challenges in the current system.

Dr. Skye Barbic, Canada Research Chair in Integrated Youth Services, aims to advance the delivery of IYS through three areas of research: standards development, measurement-based care and knowledge translation activities. By focusing on these areas, she and her research team hope to address the gaps in IYS processes, policies and practices that have been identified by youth, service providers and decision makers. Their goal is to improve health equity and health outcomes for youth in Canada.

Traditional archaeology has played a significant role in severing Indigenous communities from both their heritage and their sovereign right to develop and maintain ancestral relations. As Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Archaeology, Dr. Kristen Barnett’s aim is to help decolonize the field of archaeology.

Her research is transforming our understanding of rematriation and repatriation, including expanding what qualifies for return (beyond ancestor remains and “artifacts”) to include “ecofacts.”  By using a decolonizing lens, she and her research team are establishing archaeology as regenerative, reframing Indigenous heritage as a representation of the future, and affirming First Nations and Indigenous sovereignty. Their research will facilitate a process of remaking meaning and intergenerational connection and engagement with materials previously separated from communities. Their ultimate goal is to enable communities to heal from the cultural disruptions imposed by traditional archaeology. 

Dr. Jason Barton’s program focuses on understanding:

• how the brain takes visual input and decodes this information into meaningful interpretations that support object recognition; and
• how this is disrupted by various neurologic diseases that manifest with impairments of that recognition.

Barton’s team have a particular emphasis on “high-level” expert vision, exemplified by face and word recognition. They use functional MRI, eye tracking and sophisticated computerized tests of visual perception to advance understanding; and translate the knowledge they gain into experimental trials of rehabilitation for the various disorders.

Research involves: Studying high-level visual processing and how this processing is disrupted in patients with disorders of complex visual processing.

Research relevance: This research will increase understanding of the how the brain’s processing of visual inputs is disrupted in patients with neurological disorders.
 

There is a long-standing gap in literature and scholarship about queer Indigenous life in Canada. To date, examinations of queer indigeneity have typically focused on urban contexts. Dr. Billy-Ray Belcourt, Canada Research Chair in Queer Indigenous Cultural Production, is trying to remedy this by fostering and contributing to the emerging field of queer Indigenous studies.

To that end, he and his research team have written a novel that examines the lives of queer Indigenous peoples in northern Alberta. They are also hosting an international conference to bring together academics, activists and artists to discuss queer and trans Indigenous studies, and will publish an anthology based on the proceedings. Finally, they are developing a digital hub for queer and trans Indigenous culture and public scholarship about it. Ultimately, they aim to expand the scope of knowledge about the confluence of sexuality and race in a geographical region that has received almost no literary attention from an Indigenous point of view.

Geographical computation uses innovations in data structures, analytical approaches and visualization techniques to better represent relationships across distances and between phenomena. As Canada Research Chair in GIS, Geospatial Big Data and Digital Geohumanities, Dr. Luke Bergmann is using geographical computation to better understand the complex social and environmental interconnections of our globalized world.

He and his team are conducting foundational research to establish “relational” geographic computation. This will support the study of complex globalized geographical phenomena and shed light on how global economic and environmental change intersect and how diseases like influenza spread. Ultimately, their research will help researchers, policy-makers and the public understand global challenges that cross both borders and academic disciplines.

Messenger RNA (mRNA) is a type of single-stranded RNA involved in protein synthesis. During the COVID-19 pandemic, mRNA vaccines played a critical role in the response to the virus. These vaccines work by introducing a piece of mRNA that corresponds to the viral protein. Dr. Anna Blakney, Canada Research Chair in Nucleic Acid Bioengineering, is engineering the next generation of RNA vaccines and therapies using self-amplifying RNA.

Self-amplifying RNA is advantageous because it enables the use of a much lower vaccine dose than mRNA and has a longer duration of protein expression (30 to 60 days compared to just three to five days for mRNA). Using state-of-the-art molecular engineering, delivery systems and clinically relevant preclinical models, she and her research team aim to uncover the innate immune mechanisms that affect the efficacy of RNA formulations. 

Human beings are social creatures who need to live together to survive and flourish. Yet scholars and policy-makers have devoted comparatively little attention to our social needs outside of the family, focusing instead on economic and more overtly political needs.

Dr. Kimberley Brownlee, Canada Research Chair in Ethics and Political and Social Philosophy, aims to remedy this. She and her research team are investigating three interconnected areas of human sociability: social human rights; the connection between sociability and human flourishing; and interactional ethics—that is, the ethics that govern ordinary interactions, including the distinctive virtues, vices, goods, harms and injustices that characterize them.

Atherosclerosis, the hardening of the arteries due to a build-up of plaque, is the leading cause of death worldwide. One major risk factor is abnormal levels of plasma lipid (the cholesterol and other fats in our blood). As Canada Research Chair in Precision Cardiovascular Disease Prevention, Dr. Liam Brunham is studying the role of genetic variations in lipid metabolism to better understand this disease.

He and his research team are determining the usefulness of genetic testing for familial hypercholesterolemia (a disorder that prevents the body from removing “bad” cholesterol from the blood) in patients with acute coronary syndrome. They are also establishing a national registry of patients with elevated lipoprotein (a) and studying how the CETP gene influences high-density lipoprotein cholesterol as well as the risk of death from sepsis and severe infections. Ultimately, their research will improve the care of patients with inherited lipid abnormalities, reduce the burden of cardiovascular disease, and identify new treatments for sepsis.

A worldwide biodiversity crisis is unfolding, driven by factors like pollution, the climate crisis and human exploitation of natural resources. To address it, the world needs to take steps to effectively manage it on multiple scales at once. As Canada Research Chair in Terrestrial Mammal Conservation, Dr. Cole Burton is working to provide the knowledge needed to help do this.

He and his research team are focusing on the conservation of land mammals by testing for predictable patterns in how their communities respond to different levels of human disturbances and actions. They are applying innovative sampling and analytical tools that use camera trap surveys to understand the impacts of human activities on wildlife. (Camera traps have motion sensors and begin recording when an animal passes by.) Their findings will improve our understanding of biodiversity and inform management actions so we can better protect threatened species. 

Research involves: Using remote cameras and other tools to understand terrestrial mammal responses to changing landscapes.
 

Media have the power to support reconciliation and reflect Indigenous ways of life and knowledge-and in so doing, could contribute to resiliency and adaptation in an uncertain future. Dr. Candis Callison, Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Journalism, Media and Public Discourse, is examining how journalism might help achieve these goals.

She and her research team are looking at the challenges and opportunities that collaboration presents as a tool to solve complex problems like climate change in the face of diverse knowledge systems and settler-colonial structures, including media. They are also looking at how emerging civic spaces and public debate on digital and traditional media platforms can provide or block access to information. Ultimately, Callison and her team aim to better understand how all modes and methods of media can support intervention, truth-seeking and activism.

Indigenous Peoples have a long and beneficial relationship with the land. In their care, lands are more biodiverse and the water and air are cleaner. But despite this dedication, current land use practices across Canada have resulted in biodiversity loss and environmental degradation. This has led to a growing need to develop sustainable land use practices that enhance biodiversity and the environment’s resiliency to stress, including tools for efficient ecosystem monitoring.

As Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Governance, and Environmental Relations, Dr. Warren Cardinal-McTeague is examining how traditional land use practices, such as traditional gardening, harvesting and cultural burns, benefit the environment. He and his research team are also working with Indigenous communities to develop new methods for monitoring ecosystem health. Their aim is to build the evidence needed to support the return of sustainable Indigenous land use practices throughout Canadian society.

Because of climate change and other environmental problems, ecosystems around the world have lost species. For example, in British Columbia, ecosystems have seen losses in sea otters and the gigantic Steller’s sea cows. The question now is: Can anything be done to help ecosystems recover, or to restore species?

Dr. Kai Chan, Canada Research Chair in Re-Wilding and Social-Ecological Transformation, is trying to answer these questions. His research addresses the challenge of transforming ecosystems and linked social systems so they can survive and even thrive amid the ongoing ecological and climate crises. He and his research team are focusing on coastal ecosystems on the west coast of Vancouver Island-and on urban and agricultural systems in the metro Vancouver region-to understand how diverse systems have changed over recent decades and millennia, and how they might regain productivity and benefits in the future.

Debates about gender and Islam are currently oversimplified, and the voices of Muslim women themselves are often left out. Dr. Ayesha Chaudhry, Canada Research Chair in Religion, Law and Social Justice, is working to change that.

Chaudry’s research sits at the intersection of religion, law, and social justice. She and her research team are combining textual analysis with social commentary with a focus on how gender is (re)constructed by religious, political, and social factors to suggest visions of ideal citizenship. They are also connecting contemporary debates with historical sources to examine trans-national and multi-religious constructions of ideal Muslim women as subjects of nation states. Their research is geared toward creating a more sophisticated public discussion around Islam and ensuring Muslim women’s voices and attitudes determine how texts are interpreted and how laws are enacted.

Research involves: Reforming Islamic law by constructing a feminist Shari’a.

Research relevance: This research will lead to the development of a gender-equal vision of Islamic law.

Although tremendous progress has been made in managing and treating cancer patients, it is still the case that many tumours that initially respond to chemotherapy will eventually become resistant. Predicting and overcoming such resistance is critical to patient outcomes. To design and develop new drugs-and to select treatments that are most likely to help patients based on specific genotypes-scientists need a better genetic understanding of tumours’ mechanisms. Achieving such an understanding is the focus of Dr. Artem Cherkasov’s research.

As Canada Research Chair in Precision Cancer Drug Design, Cherkasov is using innovation and collaboration to make critical advances in precision drug design and discovery. Ultimately, he and his research team aim to contribute to a more patient-oriented, innovative and effective health-care system.

Climate change is putting extreme pressure on our natural world, including our oceans and the species that depend on them. As Canada Research Chair in Ocean Sustainability and Global Change, Dr. William Cheung is looking for answers about how the Earth can sustain life and support human well-being and food security while at the same time advancing climate mitigation and safeguarding biodiversity—or what he calls the “food, climate change and biodiversity nexus.”

He and his research team are combining scenario development, integrated social-ecological modelling, and participatory research to better understand the pathways through which we can achieve sustainable and desirable futures for Earth’s strained global ecosystems. They will deliver the results of this novel, nexus-focused research to national and international forums to inform policies and actions—establishing Canada as a leading knowledge centre for studying solutions to this global challenge.

Research involves: Studying the capacity of marine ecosystems and fisheries to adapt to climate change and exploring human interventions that boost adaptation.

Research relevance: This research will lead to effective marine adaptation interventions that will benefit ocean management and resource users in Canada and worldwide.

Children with neurodevelopmental disorders, such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and intellectual or learning disabilities, account for up to 14 per cent of children in Canada. Immune dysfunction may contribute significantly to these brain disorders or be a secondary effect of abnormal brain development. As Canada Research Chair in Understanding Gene Expression in the Brain, Dr. Annie Ciernia is shedding light on how the immune system interacts with the developing brain and how the two systems regulate gene expression to coordinate brain development.

Her research focuses on how alterations to the function of the brain’s immune cells (called microglia) in early development lead to changes in cellular function, microglia-neuron interactions, and ultimately, behavioural development. Using state-of-the-art sequencing, bioinformatics, and molecular and behavioural analytical techniques, she and her research team aim to identify new pathways and gene targets for gene- and immune-based drugs for neurodevelopmental disorders such as ASD.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted by the United Nations in 2015 as a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity by 2030. Achieving these goals requires integrated action on social, environmental and economic challenges, with a focus on development that leaves no one behind. But data for global, regional and national development policy-making are still lacking.

Dr. Tara Cookson, Canada Research Chair in Gender, Development, and Global Public Policy, is exploring the "gender data revolution"-a shift in development policy that puts gender data at the heart of efforts to achieve the SDGs. She and her research team are trying to understand the revolution in terms of its potential to shape power relations among development leaders and influence priorities and financing policy issues in the field.

Canada's landmass is almost 50 percent forest and accounts for approximately 10 percent of the world's forest resources. These forests contribute to how our climate is moderated by filtering air and water, regenerating soil, and preventing erosion. With increasing population and the subsequent demand on resources, the sustainable development and management of our forests has become of outstanding importance.

Remote sensing can deliver a range of social, economic, environmental, and scientific benefits to forestry management. It can, for example, create imagery to assess fire fuel hazard potential and pest and disease outbreaks in both native and planted forests. By integrating current and next-generation remote-sensing data with geographical and terrain information, scientists are able to provide solutions that are cost-effective and accurate.

Nicholas Coops is an expert in developing models, hardware, and software that allow remote sensing and other geographical and terrain information to be used for forest inventory, management, and conservation. As the Canada Research Chair in Remote Sensing, he is exploring advanced forest inventory techniques to help sustain the forests of British Columbia with the use of lasers and optical remote-sensing imagery.

In addition, Dr. Coops is investigating the application of remote-sensing imagery to computer visualization, to develop carbon accumulation modelling for greenhouse calculations, to assess wildfires, post-fire severity, and fuel hazard load mapping, and to detect insect damage using forest health indices. He believes his research will significantly benefit local and regional forestry communities and promote Canada as a leader in technologies that support national and international sustainability programs.

Research involves: Applying satellite and airborne remote-sensing technology to provide cost-effective and accurate solutions for sustainable forest management and conservation.

Research relevance: The research involves developing tools for forest management in order to ensure sustainable regional and national production as well as storage and conservation of carbon.

The number of seniors in the world is increasing at a rate that has no precedent in human history-and many of them will eventually face significant challenges when it comes to maintaining their independence due to mobility problems, cognitive impairments and chronic health conditions, such as diabetes.

Dr. Jennifer Davis, Canada Research Chair in Applied Health Economics, is using ground-breaking health economics methods to examine the value for money of health interventions involving physical activity that could add quality years to seniors’ lives for reasonably low costs. More specifically, she and her research team are using an innovative approach that incorporates patient perspectives for both health and cost outcomes.

Despite advances in health care, patients' abilities to make decisions about their treatments is limited because of a lack of information and support. This, in turn, affects their ability to manage their disease, stick to treatment plans, and achieve the best possible health outcomes. As Canada Research Chair in Pharmacoepidemiology, Dr. Mary De Vera aims to improve the health outcomes of Canadians who suffer from chronic diseases, particularly cancer and arthritis.

With a focus on data-driven, patient-powered research, she and her research team are studying patient-oriented epidemiology and health services to support patients who are living with these chronic diseases. In particular, they aim to shed light on solutions that could lead to better health outcomes. They are aligning their research with a World Health Organization framework that aims to put "people and communities, not diseases, at the centre of health systems."

Quantum computers are millions of times faster than the most sophisticated supercomputers in the world today. But they are susceptible to “noise” from various sources, such as disturbances in the Earth’s magnetic field, cosmic rays and even nearby qubits (the building blocks of quantum computers).

As Canada Research Chair in Quantum Software and Algorithms, Dr. Olivia Di Matteo is developing software and algorithms that mitigate and adapt to noise in quantum computers. She and her research team are designing and implementing large-scale, noise-aware techniques and creating quantum tomography methods to improve state-of-the-art experimental devices. They plan to use these results to develop robust quantum algorithms that can solve meaningful problems across a spectrum of domains. Their research will help ensure that quantum computers are used to their fullest potential. It will also pave the way for future generations of quantum software and hardware.

Single-cell genomics is the study of the individuality of cells using “omics” approaches, such as genomics, epigenomics, proteomics, metabolomics and more. A rapidly evolving field, single-cell genomics enables scientists to study tissue cells at single-cell resolution. But scientists still face the challenge of how to combine single-cell measurements and computational modelling to understand how cells are organized in tissues.

To overcome this challenge, Dr. Jiarui Ding, Canada Research Chair in Machine Learning and Single-cell Analysis, is working at the intersection of computing and biology to build mathematical models that can explain complex phenomena in biology. More specifically, he and his research team are using the human esophagus to study tissue architecture and function in healthy and diseased tissues. Their findings will have a broad impact on biological data analyses as well as data-driven clinical decision-making.

Bacteria’s ability to break down a multitude of diverse organic compounds in the biosphere is essential to maintaining the global carbon cycle and the health of ecosystems. Dr. Lindsay Eltis, Canada Research Chair in Microbial Catabolism and Biocatalysis, is working to better understand how harnessing the bacterial degradation of steroids and aromatic compounds, including lignin, could lead to more sustainable industrial processes as well as new drug targets.

Eltis has already helped identify cholesterol degradation as a drug target for treating Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Now, he and his research team are working to develop other novel tuberculosis treatments. They are also harnessing bacterial degradation activities to engineer biocatalysts and platforms to transform forest biomass into high-value products, such as resins, carbon fibres and commodity chemicals.

Research summary

Stroke is the third-leading cause of death in Canada and a significant contributor to poor health, disability and early death. Dr. Janice Eng, Canada Research Chair in Neurological Rehabilitation, is devising and implementing innovative treatments to improve patients’ recovery from stroke and help them maintain and maximize any function they regain.

She and her research team are developing effective rehabilitation treatments to optimize recovery after stroke, advancing the use of wearable sensors during therapy to provide feedback to both patients and clinicians, and using brain imaging techniques to better understand brain recovery after a stroke. To accomplish these goals, they plan to complete at least five multi-province or international clinical trials. The approaches and technologies they develop will improve the health of a large number of Canadians living with stroke, and will ultimately reduce health-care costs.

A rights conflict occurs when the rights of a person or group conflict with those of others. Legal judgments in these cases often involve complex, competing perspectives, but traditional adjudication methods typically rely on a single authoritative voice from the judge or tribunal. As Canada Research Chair in Jurisprudence and Human Rights, Dr. Julen Etxabe is developing a new “dialogical” paradigm of adjudication, where multiple voices, arguments and perspectives contribute to judgments.

Unlike conventional rulings, dialogical judgments require new interpretive methods to discern which arguments should carry weight in the final decision. This approach challenges traditional legal reasoning and authority, proposing a framework better suited to pluralistic societies that face authoritarian threats and demands from equity-deserving groups. Etxabe and his research team are creating a novel theoretical and practical approach to adjudicating rights conflicts, emphasizing democratic and anti-authoritarian principles in judicial review.

Unlike traditional cancer therapies, immunotherapy enlists the power of a patient’s immune system to attack a tumour. One such therapy, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy, uses white blood cells, called T cells, to shrink or even eradicate cancerous tumours. As Canada Research Chair in Cancer Immunotherapy, Dr. Laura Evgin seeks to make T-cell therapies more effective and accessible.

Using mouse models that are very similar to human lymphoma, Evgin and her research team are shedding light on the underlying mechanisms that lead to the failure of certain CAR T-cell treatments and coming up with solutions. By making use of techniques such as spectral flow cytometry and single-cell RNA sequencing, they aim to gain insights into how cell-based therapies interact with the systemic cancer ecosystem. They are also developing more effective treatments by applying synthetic biology in combination with oncolytic viruses and mRNA therapeutics.

Residential schools and colonial policies banned the use of Indigenous languages. As a result, many of these are endangered today. As Canada Research Chair in Health, Healing, and Community Revitalization: Indigenous Approaches to Overcoming Intergenerational Trauma and Loss, Dr. Alanaise Ferguson is revitalizing Indigenous language and culture in order to heal intergenerational trauma, grief and loss.

Working collaboratively with Indigenous communities, faculty, graduate students and allied health providers in the British Columbia interior, she and her research team are establishing the Centre for Sharing Community Voices. Through this centre, they will develop language programs as well as partnerships and trust with Nsyilxcen language speakers and relevant faculty members in order to explore, develop and implement language and cultural resurgence projects. The centre will also be a place to train the next generation of Indigenous health researchers and design and implement transformative health research projects.

Many of Canada’s most emblematic animals—like caribou, elk, deer, wolves and bears—are declining in number because human activity has altered the types of interactions that take place between species, breaking important links in the food chain. To help restore balance, Dr. Adam Ford, Canada Research Chair in Wildlife Restoration Ecology, is studying how people affect species interactions and ecological processes.

Ford and his research team are using field experiments, GPS tracking and satellite imagery to explore the impact of human activity on interactions between people, large predators (such wolves, bears and cougars), their prey (deer and elk), and plants in landscapes that have been altered by people. They are investigating how industry, infrastructure and human-wildlife conflict change species abundance as well as the way species move through the landscape and interact. Wildlife restoration ecology now forms the backbone of environmental legislation in Canada. This research will support Canada’s international commitments to conserve biodiversity and support reconciliation with Indigenous communities.

Research involves: Landscape restoration for large mammal food webs

Research relevance: This research will lead to the recovery of wildlife in human-modified landscapes, and improved safety for people along roads.
 

Canada is facing a housing crisis: prices have been skyrocketing for decades, rents are increasingly unaffordable, and overcrowding and homelessness are on the rise. Detailed data on the housing needs of vulnerable households could help cities create more targeted affordability policies, but these data currently do not exist.

As Canada Research Chair in Data Innovation for Housing and Inclusive Urbanization, Dr. Julia Harten is trying to fill this gap. Drawing on web-scraped online rental listings, anonymized utility data, and community-engaged fieldwork, she and her research team are generating new data that will help researchers study rental housing in urban Canada more comprehensively. They aim to focus more attention on the changing housing outcomes and needs of Canada’s low-income earners and other socially marginalized groups. Their work will be relevant to cities around the world that are struggling with affordable housing supply.

Research coproduction—a process whereby researchers and research users work together to generate knowledge—can lead to more ethical, inclusive and impactful results. Yet current systems often support tokenism rather than meaningful partnerships. As Canada Research Chair in Research Coproduction and Implementation Science, Dr. Heather Gainforth is transforming how research systems support coproduction.

Focusing on spinal cord injury research, she and her research team are identifying promising practices, co-developing evaluation tools, and building a learning system to support institutional change. They will share their findings through an international network dedicated to improving research partnerships. By building a cumulative and actionable science of research coproduction, Gainforth’s work will help ensure research is not only scientifically rigorous, but also grounded in the needs, values and lived experiences of the people it’s meant to serve.

With more than a million and a half Londoners working at night, the city’s nighttime economy is estimated at about $45 billion a year. But the number of LGBTQ clubs, bars and performance spaces in London has been decreasing dramatically. In fact, between 2006 and 2016, the number of queer nightlife venues declined by more than half. As Canada Research Chair in Urban Sexualities, Dr. Amin Ghaziani is trying to determine how the city is responding to this shift and what innovations the community is coming up with. 

Ghaziani and his research team are investigating the effects of economic and cultural forces on the creative core of the city at night. Ultimately, they hope to better understand the forces behind the decline in queer nightlife spaces in London and other cities around the world. 

Environmental modelling helps inform decisions and policies by improving our understanding of natural systems and how they react to changing conditions and hazards, such as exposure to air pollution and toxic chemicals. As Canada Research Chair in Environmental Modelling for Policy, Dr. Amanda Giang is developing systems modelling frameworks that will shed light on the interactions between human activity, environmental impacts and human well-being.

She and her research team aim to address methodological challenges in impact assessments, where innovations in weaving emerging data sources and quantitative and qualitative methods can yield insights for both technology and policy interventions. In particular, they are assessing the environmental impacts of decarbonizing maritime transport, characterizing the cumulative impacts of multiple air pollutants on human exposure and equity, and disentangling the effects of climate and human activity on contaminants in traditional Arctic foods.

It is a challenging time to be a farmer in Canada. In addition to the effects of climate change, farmers are dealing with rising production costs, labour shortages, consumer concerns about environmental impact, animal health and welfare issues, and limited land, feed and water resources. As Canada Research Chair in Animal Functional Genomics and Microbiome, Dr. Leluo Guan aims to address the urgent and emerging challenges that Canada’s livestock sectors and related food industries are facing.

She and her research team are developing and implementing innovative technologies for sustainable and smart agriculture and food systems. They are applying multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches to understand host-microbiome interactions in cattle and providing omics-based solutions. Their goal is to generate the knowledge needed to provide the industry with climate adaptation and mitigation technologies in order to improve animal productivity, health and welfare.

In Canada, more than 5.8 million people have diseases that make it challenging to breathe, like asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Earlier diagnosis and better treatments could improve their quality of life.

Dr. Tillie-Louise Hackett, Canada Research Chair in Asthma and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Pathobiology and Therapeutics, is using ultra-resolution imaging to identify lung diseases at their earliest stages—before they can be detected using currently available tests. This will help define the cellular and molecular changes that cause them. Ultimately, she and her research team are working to better understand how these lung diseases develop and open the door to new approaches for predicting, diagnosing and treating them.

Ovarian cancer is the fifth most common cancer in women, and it is the most serious one. Dr. Gillian Hanley, Canada Research Chair in Population-Based Gynecologic and Perinatal Outcomes, is using population-based data to answer questions about ovarian cancer and to study women’s mental health during and right after pregnancy.

Hanley and her research team are looking at whether opportunistic salpingectomy-the removal of a woman’s fallopian tubes during hysterectomy, or instead of tubal ligation-is an effective way to prevent ovarian cancer. In addition, they are examining the long-term developmental consequences-including social and emotional impacts and effects on language and cognitive development-for children who are exposed to depression and anti-depressants while in utero. Hanley and her team are also using machine learning and population-based datasets to identify women who are at risk for postpartum depression.

Indigenous knowledge, perspectives, and pedagogies are often excluded from or marginalized in post-secondary classrooms. However, there is a movement afoot in Canada and internationally to include these aspects of Indigenous traditions in education.

As Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Pedagogy, Dr. Jan Hare is examining the complex processes of learning to teach using Indigenous knowledge frameworks. To this end, she and her research team are focusing on instructor knowledge, beliefs and practices from across faculties and disciplines in higher education. Ultimately, they hope to establish evidence-informed practices for improving how instructors teach and students learn from Indigenous knowledge traditions.

Many inflammatory and genetic diseases that affect the human epithelia—the protective layers of cells that line the body’s surfaces, including the skin, lungs and digestive tract—are poorly understood and not easily treated. As Canada Research Chair in Human Disease Models, Dr. Sarah Hedtrich is trying to bridge this knowledge gap. She and her research team are developing bioengineered human disease models, including “organ-on-chip” systems, to study how diseases manifest, progress and respond to treatment.

Using human-based models rather than traditional animal studies for the work improves its accuracy and accelerates the development of next-generation therapies. By collaborating with clinicians, engineers and life scientists from various disciplines, Hedtrich and her team are unravelling disease-causing mechanisms and refining precision medicine approaches. Their work is paving the way for more effective, patient-specific treatments, ensuring that biomedical advancements translate more efficiently from lab to clinic.

Breathing isn’t something most people think about much-it’s an automatic process for most of us. But your breath actually contains an astonishing amount of information about your health, and scientists are working on how best to capture it.

Dr. Jane Hill, Canada Research Chair in Breath Science and Technology, is building better tools-such as samplers, microanalytical systems and informatics-to improve basic breath science and clinical breath science applications, such as biomarker discovery, translation and validation. She and her research team envision a future where breathing into an inexpensive handheld device can instantly deliver accurate information about various aspects of human health.

The multilateral trading system has played a critical role in ensuring stability and order in the global economy for more than 70 years. But it has recently been thrown into crisis. With the two dominant powers in the system—the United States and China—blatantly violating its rules, the established liberal trading order is in danger of collapse. As Canada Research Chair in Global Policy, Dr. Kristen Hopewell is analyzing how states are responding to the current trade crisis.

She and her research team are exploring the ongoing battle to “save the WTO” (World Trade Organization) as well as various reform efforts within the organization. Hopewell’s team is also examining how various actors are challenging the existing norms (contestation dynamics) and the tensions between those trying to preserve the current system and those fighting it. Their findings will contribute to global policy debates about free trade and the future of the global trading system.

Metabolomics is a biotechnology that enables scientists to study the complete set of small-molecule chemicals found in cells, tissues and organisms. It offers valuable, measurable insights into how living organisms interact with their surroundings. Metabolomics has the capacity to comprehensively detect environmental exposures, commonly referred to as the exposome. Mass spectrometry serves as the predominant analytical platform used to collect metabolomics data.

Dr. Tao Huan, Canada Research Chair in Metabolomics and Exposomics, aims to advance analytical chemistry and bioinformatics for mass spectrometry-based metabolomics to detect, characterize and interpret environmental chemicals. The methods he and his research team develop will also be implemented in exposome applications to shed light on how environmental risk factors contribute to human health and diseases.

The growth of cloud computing and big data is creating an information storage crisis. Although innovations in information density, stability, and energy consumption are coming, memory materials are approaching their limits. But could human DNA offer the answer to this challenge?

DNA can retain information for thousands to millions of years, and take 100 million times less energy to operate compared to state-of-the-art electronic memory. As Canada Research Chair in DNA Engineering, Dr. William Hughes is tapping into the structural integrity, information density and programmability of life’s most basic material to develop technologies to address today’s data storage challenges. He and his research team aim to create a storage paradigm, based on nucleic acid memory, in which information is stored in space, time and sequence. Their research could lead to the development of an optical, single-molecule sequencing technology to support DNA data storage.

The COVID-19 pandemic led to supply chain challenges related to manufacturing, transportation and product availability. It also contributed to a change in consumers’ priorities. The result has been a shift in the types of products and services people want and how much they value them. This new landscape requires corresponding adaptations in business practices, such as supply chain configuration, inventory replenishment, capacity allocation and pricing.

As Canada Research Chair in Operations Excellence and Business Analytics, Dr. Woonghee Huh is studying how to match supply and demand in supply chains and service systems. Using business analytics, he and his research team are investigating how ?rms can make operations decisions based on emerging data, e?ectively combining learning and optimization. Ultimately, their research will help Canadian and international companies and organizations to develop more efficient supply chains.

Mental illness affects some 1.2 million Canadian children and youth, and nearly three-quarters of people who live with a mental illness see their symptoms begin before the age of 18. As Canada Research Chair in Socioecological Approaches to Mental Health and Substance Use, Dr. Emily Jenkins is working with youth and their communities to advance research in youth mental health and substance use.

She and her research team are using participatory research approaches that emphasize co-discovery with communities-particularly those who are equity seeking-and bring citizens’ voices to policy and practice agendas to tackle key health and social issues. They are generating evidence to inform interventions that will promote positive mental health and substance use outcomes at both the individual and societal levels. Their work will guide interventions and policies to protect and promote positive mental health and substance use outcomes for youth in Canada and beyond.

A healthy diet can reduce the risk of developing certain chronic diseases. As the incidence of diet-related diseases continues to increase, there is an urgent need for policy change. Dr. Mahsa Jessri, Canada Research Chair in Nutritional Epidemiology and Big Data Analytics, is working on research to inform changes to Canada’s nutrition policies.

Jessri and her research team are developing multi-dimensional dietary patterns aimed at preventing chronic diseases and investigating the systems that underpin policies, such as those related to package labelling. The innovative big data infrastructure they are maintaining will enable state-of-the-art, timely modelling of how Canadians’ health and health care outcomes might shift in response to policy changes that focus on food supply. 

Wood is a sustainable and renewable material that has been widely used in lumber, wood-based panels and pulp. But biomass, the biological material that comes from trees, can be converted into a wide variety of products, not only traditional forest products. As Canada Research Chair in Sustainable Functional Biomaterials, Dr. Feng Jiang aims to develop a cost-effective and energy-efficient means to convert wood residues and other biomass into high-performance, functional, bio-based products.

He and his research team are developing new technologies to isolate and modify lignocellulosic nanomaterials (tiny, nano-sized materials derived from lignin, cellulose and hemicellulose) from biomass residues and convert these into functional materials with commercial potential. Ultimately, their research will help make Canada a leader in the production of renewable and biodegradable products.

Research involves: Using sophisticated nanotechnology to develop high value-added, functional materials from forest biomass.

Research relevance: This research will advance wood-based nanotechnology to promote the sustainable development and competitiveness of the Canadian forest product sector.

Aero-engine turbine blades operate under harsh environments characterized by high temperatures and pressures, and the high cost of replacing damaged parts makes repairing them a more cost-effective (and sustainable) solution. Additive manufacturing-machining technology has emerged as a promising solution to repairing turbine blades. However, to take advantage of this technology, we need a better understanding of the process mechanisms and uncertainties in individual damaged sections and the process conditions during manufacturing.

As Canada Research Chair in Advanced Manufacturing, Dr. Xiaoliang Jin is using hybrid additive manufacturing-machining with adaptive capability to enhance process efficiency and the quality of parts in repairing or remanufacturing turbine blades. Using physics-based modelling and data-driven approaches, he and his research team are generating new knowledge to determine the residual stress evolution in hybrid manufacturing, which directly governs a repaired part’s quality. They are also creating a system that adjusts the process automatically to make it faster and ensure consistent quality.

Lipids are the main building blocks of membrane-bound compartments called organelles, which underlie the function of cells in every organism. For lipids to fulfil their function in building and expanding organelle membranes, they need to be transported from their site of synthesis to their respective destination. Despite the importance of this process, we understand very little about it. As Canada Research Chair in Lipid and Organelle Biology, Dr. Arun John Peter aims to unveil the transport pipelines of lipids and their impact on organelle function.

He and his research team are using a new technology called METALIC (Mass tagging Enabled TrAcking of Lipids In Cells) to monitor lipid trafficking between organelles inside living cells. This will enable them to better understand how this distribution network aids the rapid spread of organelles in cancer and to decipher how defects in this process contribute to organelle dysfunction in neurodegenerative diseases.

Ecohydrology is the study of how water and ecological systems interact. By improving our understanding of this relationship, we can improve water scarcity, enhance biodiversity and make the most of opportunities for sustainable development. Dr. Mark Johnson, Canada Research Chair in Ecohydrology, is investigating ecosystem services related to water resources with a focus on agricultural systems, carbon fluxes in ecohydrological systems, and the resilience of managed ecohydrological systems.

He and his research team are using field-based experiments, remote sensing and modelling to learn more about the interactions among water resources, ecological functions and land use practices. They hope to evaluate how land use practices influence coupled hydrological and ecological processes, and how impacts on these ecohydrological processes further affect ecosystem services, including carbon sequestration. Their work may lead to strategies to improve the sustainability of land use practices with respect to freshwater security.

Research involves: Evaluating sustainability aspects of water resources and ecosystem services in agriculture, forestry and urban systems.

Research relevance: This work will improve environmental management practices by improving our understanding of interactions between water resources and ecosystem services, including freshwater availability and carbon sequestration.

Cancer is a disease of the genome. Mutations can occur in our DNA that affect cells’ abilities to control replication. Uncontrolled cellular division leads to cancer.

Dr. Steven Jones, Canada Research Chair in Computational Genomics, uses computational and genomic methods to accurately identify and interpret these genetic changes. Determining how such mutations contribute to the disease is a key step toward fully understanding cancer biology, including how clinically similar cancers may differ between patients.

The specific combination of genetic changes within a cancer will dictate what drug sensitivities a tumour may have and how it will respond to therapy. Jones and his research team aim to unravel the mystery of which cancers will respond to which drug. They are also exploring which mutations typically make tumours resistant to certain therapies.

Jones’ vision is that in the future, cancer patients will routinely undergo comprehensive genomic analyses of their tumours. This analysis will provide clinicians with the required insight into the molecular workings of the tumour and the most appropriate treatment. Jones and his team hope to develop the tools and knowledge to help make such a vision a reality.

Research involves: Using computational approaches to interpret the genetic changes that occur in human cancers and their relevance to drug sensitivity.

Research relevance: This research will identify new approaches for treating cancer.

Women have long been recommended to take iron and folic acid supplements during pregnancy to prevent anemia, sepsis, low birthweight and preterm birth. But recent evidence suggests that current Canadian and World Health Organization guidelines on supplementation may be outdated. As Canada Research Chair in Micronutrients and Human Health, Dr. Crystal Karakochuk is reassessing these policies to determine whether iron and folic acid supplements are safe, effective and necessary for women and children.

She and her research team have two key goals: to evaluate the risk versus the benefit of these micronutrient interventions, and to improve diagnostic methods and evaluate biomarkers for anemia and iron deficiency to support individual- and population-level assessment. Karakochuk’s research is bringing together clinicians, researchers and policy-makers to advance and apply innovative knowledge in human nutrition and to provide health, social and economic benefits to women, children and families.

Acute myeloid leukemia is an aggressive blood cancer that is extremely difficult to treat because it is spread by rare leukemic stem cells that can evade most current therapies. As a result, this cancer has a high fatality rate. As Canada Research Chair in Myeloid Cancers, Dr. Aly Karsan is trying to understand how these cells resist therapy and figure out how to target them using new treatments.

He and his research team are using cutting-edge genomic, epigenomic and functional techniques to examine single blood cancer cells. Because each patient’s acute myeloid leukemia harbours multiple different leukemic stem cells, Karsan and his team are looking for common pathways in different types of leukemic stem cells that could be used to target the disease. Ultimately, they hope to provide the knowledge needed to develop new therapies for patients who do not respond to standard treatments.

The use of illicit drugs leads to more than 750,000 preventable deaths globally every year. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, overdose rates have surged in Canada, due in large part to the prevalence of fentanyl and fentanyl analogues, interruptions in drug supply chains, and reduced access to harm reduction and other support services.

Dr. Mary Clare Kennedy, Canada Research Chair in Substance Use Policy and Practice Research, is generating policy- and practice-relevant evidence to help develop, implement and make use of new substance use interventions. In particular, she and her research team are identifying the impacts of new policies and practices in the delivery of supervised consumption services. They are also characterizing the influence of different factors on the access to, and outcomes of, safe supply programs. Ultimately, they aim to advance health equity and improve health outcomes for drug users in Canada and internationally.

For most patients, the diagnosis of bipolar disorder often doesn’t occur as quickly as it could. This leads to substantial delays in receiving appropriate treatment, which in turn has serious negative consequences for patients’ health.

As Canada Research Chair in Early Intervention in Psychosis/Bipolar Disorder, Dr. Kamyar Keramatian is exploring the barriers that prevent timely diagnosis and treatment of the disorder and identifying potential ways to ensure earlier intervention. He and his research team are also evaluating the effectiveness of a new psychoeducational and resilience-enhancing program to encourage young individuals at higher risk of developing bipolar disorder to seek help. In addition, the team is identifying potential biomarkers that could predict the development of the disorder in high-risk individuals. Their goal is to ensure that patients with bipolar disorder get the treatment they need as quickly as possible.

Inflammatory and immune-mediated diseases affect one in three Canadians and cost the Canadian economy more than $100 billion every year. As Canada Research Chair in Immunomodulation Materials and Immunotherapy, Dr. Jayachandran Kizhakkedathu is trying to develop new approaches to treat and prevent immunothrombosis (a condition that affect the small blood vessels) and the immunological rejection of organs and cells along with ways to protect blood vessels in patients with inflammatory conditions.

He and his research team are bringing new directions and innovations to immunomodulation materials and immunotherapy. They are developing unique, biologically active polymers, new chemistry and chemical biology approaches, and animal models. Their work will lead to more transplantable organs, better survival rates for transplant recipients, and new treatments for thrombosis and disorders that damage the small blood vessels.

In the 1960s, the experiences of Indigenous people in Canada became a subject for plays being performed in Canadian theatre—and by the 1990s, they were a part of mainstream theatre in the country. As Canada Research Chair in Land-based and Relational Dramaturgies, Dr. Lindsay Lachance is supporting Indigenous theatre-making by exploring land-based approaches to contemporary theatre.

Her research examines land-based and relational dramaturgies. These may involve physical interactions with land and water, or may be invoked philosophically in developing a process’s framework (or practitioners may look to create stories and language structures as land-based resources). These processes are important for thinking through the political iterations of Indigenous people who practise theatre in Canada despite their historical exclusion from it. Lachance is developing a research collective with theatre artists and academics that will result in an educational document, a monograph to fill a gap in the field’s scholarship, and an anthology and podcast based on the collective’s findings.

Software now powers nearly every aspect of daily life—yet bugs and vulnerabilities can cause widespread disruptions, from leaked personal data to global system failures. As generative artificial intelligence (AI) reshapes how software is built, there is growing urgency to improve the security, correctness and efficiency of both human- and AI-written code. As Canada Research Chair in Software Testing and Analysis, Dr. Caroline Lemieux is developing tools to detect bugs and automatically fix security vulnerabilities across multiple programming languages.

She and her research team are also tackling software inefficiency by building tools that reveal the performance and environmental costs of software. By combining advanced testing strategies with AI-generated code suggestions, their work will help developers catch and fix more errors. The resulting tools and benchmarks will support industry and academic partners—making software safer and faster before it reaches the public.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a chronic lung disease that causes breathing difficulties, coughing and wheezing. There are treatments available to relieve some of the symptoms and minimize complications, but the disease generally gets worse over time.

As Canada Research Chair in Canada Research Chair in Translational Airway Biology, Dr. Janice Leung is looking for better ways to treat patients with COPD. She and her research team are focusing on the intersection between infection and chronic lung disease, where persistent stimulation by disease-causing microbes and viruses can lead to irreversible airway injuries. By integrating microbiome sequencing with host cellular responses, she and her team are characterizing the relationship between dysbiosis (an imbalance in the lung’s microbial environment) and COPD. Ultimately, they hope to identify new genes and microbial targets that could stop the disease from progressing.

The human immune system affects almost every aspect of our health—and there is much that can go wrong with it. For example, there are more than 80 different auto-immune diseases. Scientists still have much to learn about what causes them and how best to treat them.

Dr. Megan Levings, Canada Research Chair in Engineered Immune Tolerance, is trying to understand how the immune system regulates itself. She and her research team hope to use this information to develop precise ways to treat immune-related diseases, such as autoimmunity or transplant rejection. They are exploring how to create and monitor “designer” T regulatory cells (better known as Tregs), a type of white blood cell that maintains immune tolerance, to tailor them for disease- and patient-specific function. Ultimately, Levings hopes to transform the treatments available to patients suffering from immune-related diseases.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) refers to the practices and policies that companies adopt to exert a positive influence on the world—such as minimizing environmental harm or establishing a budget for charitable donations. Dr. Kai Li, Canada Research Chair in Corporate Governance, is exploring the factors that can prevent companies from investing in CSR. 

She and her research team are investigating how the composition of intangible assets drives firm value in order to understand how companies can be encouraged to invest more in research and development—an important part of improving Canada’s performance on innovation. They are also examining barriers to implementing CSR, with a focus on two obstacles: cultural incongruency (conflict between management’s and employees’ values) and distortions in corporate governance (such as inadequate consideration of CSR in executive compensation). Their research will help companies figure out how they can improve CSR, which is essential for economic prosperity and to protect the environment and social values.

Plant diseases caused by microbial pathogens are threatening global crop production and impacting food quality. To come up with strategies for controlling epidemics caused by these pathogens and support sustainable agriculture, we need to better understand how plants interact with and defend themselves from microbial pathogens as well as how pathogens survive in harsh environments.

As Canada Research Chair in Plant Immunity, Dr. Xin Li is trying to answer two main questions: How do plants use immune receptors to activate protective responses to pathogens? And how does the notorious soil-borne pathogen, Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, survive in soil and cause catastrophic disease in diverse hosts? By shedding light on these questions, Li and her research team hope to find new ways to improve host immunity and discover specific targets for pathogen control, among other breakthroughs, ultimately leading to new and better resources for protecting crops.

As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes more integrated into fields where privacy is important—like health care—ensuring its reliability, security and fairness is essential. Dr. Xiaoxiao Li, Canada Research Chair in Responsible Artificial Intelligence, is developing innovative AI systems that can learn from diverse, multi-source datasets while protecting data integrity.

Li and her research team are improving AI decision-making in situations where data are inconsistent, diverse or changing. They are also strengthening security in real-world applications and creating a trustworthy federated learning platform (an AI training method that allows multiple devices or institutions to train a machine learning model collaboratively without needing to share raw data). These advances will maximize AI’s potential while minimizing risks, making AI systems more transparent and ethical. By driving responsible AI development, Li’s research will support safer, more equitable applications in health care and other data-sensitive industries.

Interactions among cells can dictate biological processes that range from the development of an organism to the onset of disease. Understanding the mechanisms behind these processes could help scientists discover new treatments for diseases such as cancer as well as a range of neurodegenerative diseases. But doing so requires force measurement and control at the molecular level.

To meet this challenge, Dr. Isaac Li, Canada Research Chair in Single-Molecule Biophysics and Mechanobiology, is developing new tools and methods to investigate how molecular forces regulate cell function in the immune and nervous systems. He and his research team are using an interdisciplinary approach that combines DNA nanotechnology, single-molecule biophysics and mechanobiology. Beyond advancing fundamental molecular and cellular research, their findings could contribute to new treatments for a variety of diseases.

School closures, program cuts and teacher attrition during the COVID-19 pandemic have worsened the educational inequities already faced by disadvantaged children. The diminished access to technology, English learning opportunities and other resources also resulted in significant losses in language and literacy among these groups of children. As Canada Research Chair in Transnational/Global Perspectives on Language and Literacy Education of Children and Youth, Dr. Guofang Li aims to address these educational inequities.

She and her research team are working to better understand the extent of literacy development loss during the pandemic among bilingual children from minority backgrounds. They are also identifying different factors in schools, homes and communities that have contributed to this loss. Ultimately, their goal is to better prepare teachers for teaching super-diverse student populations and ensure all students have equitable access to learning opportunities.

Metals like copper, nickel and rare earth elements are key components in the batteries and clean technologies that we need to address the climate crisis. But mining them can have negative environmental impacts, such as habitat destruction, soil erosion, water contamination, air pollution and ecosystem disruption. Dr. Wenying Liu, Canada Research Chair in Battery Materials Extraction, is combining recent innovations in genomics and large dataset analytics to develop methods and processes for extracting metals from ores and other sources in a more environmentally friendly and socially responsible manner.

She and her research team are using their expertise in hydrometallurgy and mine waste to support the transition from processing high-grade ores using energy-, water- and chemical-intensive methods to treating low-grade materials with minimal environmental impact and a lower carbon footprint. Ultimately, this will allow for safer, cleaner and more efficient supplies of these necessary metals.

The number of Canadians over the age of 65 is expected to double in the next 20 years. As our population ages, it is critical that we discover and put in place effective strategies to encourage healthy aging. Evidence shows that exercise promotes both cognitive health and mobility as we age, but it is unclear how much exercise we should be getting. To develop precise recommendations, we need to better understand how exercise benefits cognition and mobility. As Canada Research Chair in Healthy Aging, Dr. Teresa Liu-Ambrose hopes to generate this knowledge.

By focusing on those most at risk for decline, she and her research team aim to generate precise recommendations that will maximize the benefits of exercise for individuals. Their findings will promote healthy aging by shaping practice guidelines that can be implemented in communities and integrated into health-care services.

In a world with an expanding population and a finite supply of natural resources, it is increasingly important to find ways to put renewable resources to work. Dr. Mark MacLachlan, Canada Research Chair in Supramolecular Materials, is using supramolecular chemistry—or “chemistry beyond the molecule”—to look for these.

In supramolecular chemistry, building blocks are organized into complex structures that give them remarkable properties. This is similar to nature’s approach to making materials like bone and shells. MacLachlan and his research team are emulating nature’s construction methods by building new materials out of cellulose nanocrystals and graphene oxide—nanomaterials that are thinner than one 10,000th the width of a human hair. They are also organizing cellulose nanocrystals into highly porous structures that can be used to contain oil spills. The new materials they develop from renewable resources could lead to innovative applications in pressure sensing, robotics and oil spill clean-up.

Haptics is the science and technology of transmitting and understanding information through touch. Also known as kinaesthetic communication or 3D touch, haptic technologies can create an experience of touch for people by applying forces, vibrations or motions. Dr. Karon MacLean, Canada Research Chair in Interactive Human Systems Design, is trying to mobilize haptic design and robotics to better understand the emotional and functional bases of affective touch, such as hugging.

She and her research team are trying to lower the barriers to using complex human-facing systems by incorporating design examples that lead to theories, guidelines and supportive socio-technical ecosystems. Their work is supporting complex health-care situations by guiding technical advances with patient-centred design. Ultimately, their collaborative approach aims to tackle some of our health-care system’s most urgent needs.

The mining sector is a vital part of Canada’s economy, but it is also extremely energy-intensive. Given the ever-growing concerns about climate change, the mining industry is actively seeking alternative energy solutions to shrink its carbon footprint. As Canada Research Chair in Advanced Mine Energy Systems, Dr. Seyed Ali Ghoreishi-Madiseh is developing solutions to address future challenges in the decarbonization of mine energy systems.

He and his research team are developing new thermal storage systems and geothermal cooling solutions for integration into conventional and renewable mine energy systems. They are also developing electrified mining systems (such as new electric hydrogen and battery electric mining equipment and microwave-assisted rock breakage systems) and engineering the knowledge needed to design and implement carbon capture in mine tailings and subsurface formations. Ultimately, their work has the potential to enhance the sustainability and competitiveness of the mining industry in Canada and globally.

Research involves: Developing novel alternative, renewable and ultra-efficient mine energy systems.

Research relevance: This research will improve the mining industry by reducing its carbon footprint and increasing its energy efficiency and sustainability.
 

Cell migration is essential for a variety of biological processes, such as immune response, the spread of cancer and the formation of an embryo. As Canada Research Chair in Theoretical and Computational Biology, Dr. Anotida Madzvamuse is trying to formulate predictive mechano-biochemical models for single cells that migrate through complex, deforming (shape- or structure-changing) 2D and 3D environments.

He and his research team are using a new mathematical approach (known as bulk-surface extracellular partial differential equations) to couple mechanical properties with biochemical processes. This approach will enable them to study how this coupling affects three continuously evolving domains (the nucleus, cytosol and extracellular matrix) and their energetic manifolds (nuclear and plasma membranes). Along with carrying out mathematical analysis, statistical parameter inference, and experimental validation, he and his team are developing software to help translate basic research findings into practical applications in clinical or real-world settings.

Every year, Canada and the United States receive thousands of migrants. These newcomers must rebuild their lives and create new identities. Dr. Neda Maghbouleh, Canada Research Chair in Race, Ethnicity, Migration and Identity, seeks to understand how racial and ethnic identity is formed when immigrants and refugees resettle in a new country, with a particular focus on Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) newcomers who come to North America.

She and her research team are analyzing how integration challenges that Syrian refugees face affect the formation of their new identities in Canada. They are also developing a theory to better understand complex identities in North America—such as MENA, West Asian and Arab identities—and investigating how these are assigned and claimed in contexts shaped by immigration and demographic change. Ultimately, Maghbouleh’s findings could support policies that will help build a just society in Canada and beyond

Maps of the world portray oceans as vast, blue, empty spaces. But oceans are neither vacant nor lawless. In fact, they are among the most legally and politically contested regions in the world today. But how have present-day conflicts been shaped by the maritime histories of European imperialism and anti-colonial challenges to imperial power?

Dr. Renisa Mawani, Canada Research Chair in Colonial Legal Histories, is drawing on archival materials to examine how Britain’s legal regulation of Indian traders and anti-colonials in the Indian Ocean informed maritime legal governance and shaped the development of an international legal order. By studying the perspectives of Indian traders who challenged British Imperial and maritime control, Mawani and her research team hope to offer new perspectives on the legal histories of the Indian Ocean-a region that remains at the forefront of many current legal and political disputes.

This year alone, more than 1.3 million people around the world will be diagnosed with a gynecologic cancer-and some 900,000 will die from their disease. As Canada Research Chair in Molecular Stratification of Gynecologic Cancers, Dr. Jessica McAlpine aims to shed light on the genomic differences between tumours and determine how these differences impact the way a disease presents, how it responds to therapy, and what the outcomes may be for patients.

She and her research team are using molecular stratification to advance precision medicine for people with gynecologic cancer. They are categorizing cancers into biologically similar categories that will direct patient care and treatment. By employing this objective molecular categorization of tumours and algorithms, they hope to reduce disparities that persist in cancer care. They are also conducting a clinical trial to stratify care by molecular features, and will measure any improvements in clinical outcomes, health costs and patient quality of life.

Gravitational waves are tiny distortions of spacetime. The detectors that researchers use to identify them have ushered in a whole new era of astronomy, offering a different view of the Universe than light can provide, with profound implications for physics. As Canada Research Chair in Gravitational Wave Astrophysics, Dr. Jessica McIver is working to come up with new insights into hyper-dense matter, relativistic jets, the origin of heavy elements, and the Universe’s rate of expansion.

She and her research team are harnessing the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) detectors to learn more about the Universe through increasingly distant cataclysmic disturbances. The LIGO is a large-scale physics experiment and observatory designed to detect cosmic gravitational waves and develop gravitational-wave observations as an astronomical tool. McIver and her research team aim to provide new insights that will support LIGO detector upgrades and improve its performance.

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) affects some 400,000 children and adolescents in Canada. Many young people with ADHD have trouble making and keeping friends because of difficulties in areas like emotional regulation, impulsivity and reading social cues. Research has tended to focus on identifying and fixing what children with ADHD are “doing wrong” to cause this social exclusion. But Dr. Amori Mikami, Canada Research Chair in Clinical Child Psychology, is looking at the issue from the other side—exploring what might help peer groups to be more welcoming toward children with ADHD.

She and her research team are identifying steps that parents and teachers can take to encourage peers to be more socially inclusive, reduce social hierarchies, and break down stigma about ADHD. They are also examining the peer interactions and social relationships of adolescents with ADHD in the digital world. Mikami’s goal is to develop innovative interventions that create more inclusive spaces for all children who are considered “different,” including those with ADHD.

As Canada continues to face an opioid overdose crisis, hospital emergency departments remain important places to identify and support people at risk who may be missed by public health programs. As Canada Research Chair in Emergency Response to the Opioid Overdose Crisis, Dr. Jessica Moe is looking for better ways to identify those at risk of opioid overdose and improve their access to supports and treatments.

She and her research team are trying to optimize emergency department screening and reduce the barriers to accessing harm-reduction and life-saving therapies. They are developing innovations that adapt to changing overdose trends and population needs, with a focus on buprenorphine and naloxone microdosing in emergency departments and continuous pulse oximetry at overdose prevention services (to monitor the oxygen levels of people smoking opioids). Ultimately, they aim to reduce the harms associated with drug use and prevent overdose deaths.

Random processes play a role in everything from the shuffling of a deck of cards to the spread of a disease to the evolution of genes within a population. These random processes often live in a space within a geometric structure. As Canada Research Chair in Probability, Dr. Mathav Murugan aims to understand how the long-term behaviour of random processes relates to the geometry of the underlying space.

He and his research team are developing robust, widely applicable methods to obtain quantitative estimates of the behaviour of diffusions, random walks, and jump processes, or more generally Markov processes. Markov processes are used to model a wide range of phenomena in physics, biology, statistics and finance. By improving our understanding of the interactions between the behaviour of random processes and their underlying geometry, Murugan’s research will address novel questions at the interface between probability, analysis and geometry.

Human activity is changing the climate in unprecedented and irreversible ways. Dr. Astrida Neimanis, Canada Research Chair in Feminist Environmental Humanities, is looking at the looming climate catastrophe through a feminist environmental lens that focuses on human-water relations.

Neimanis and her research team are working on strategies for living with climate catastrophe. They are developing "hydrofeminism" as a theoretical framework that integrates feminist, social justice and environmental concerns, and they are testing these theories through case studies that explore human connections to waterscapes. They are also assembling artists, educators, policy-makers and other community members in collaborative research workshops. Along with generating new theoretical knowledge, they hope to contribute to teaching methods, enhance models of community resilience, and highlight how the arts and humanities can contribute to the response to climate change.

Various challenges in medicine may have solutions that lie in the innovative use of data. As Canada Research Chair in Data Science and Analytics, Dr. Raymond Ng is developing next-generation tools and methods to analyze text streams and sensor data for use in disease and wellness monitoring.

One of his goals is to develop tools to extract targeted information from clinical documents, such as pathology and radiology reports. This could reduce the likelihood of false positives in cancer reporting and make it easier to select appropriate cancer treatments and classify patients’ risk of relapse. Ng and his research team also aim to analyze user-generated content to predict patients’ likelihood of developing psychiatric conditions or harming themselves. Finally, they are figuring out how to promote the sharing of sensitive medical data and content by generating synthetic data that can preserve privacy.

As the world looks for ways to reduce carbon emissions and build more sustainable economies, researchers are turning to electrocatalysis to help transform captured carbon dioxide (CO2) into useful chemicals. This emerging field offers a way to use electricity to recycle CO2, potentially creating greener fuels and industrial materials. As Canada Research Chair in Molecular and Interfacial Electrocatalysts, Dr. Eva Nichols is developing catalysts designed to improve the speed, efficiency and selectivity of CO2 conversion.

By studying both well-defined molecular catalysts and modified electrode surfaces, she and her research team are revealing how the structure of a catalyst—and its chemical surroundings—can affect performance. Combining synthesis, electrochemistry and spectroscopy, their research is uncovering key reaction steps and contributing to the design of better systems. Their findings could lead to cleaner, more efficient CO2 conversion technologies, supporting Canada’s climate goals and advancing sustainable chemical manufacturing.

Translational genomics aims to improve human health by building on genetics discoveries and applying them in the clinical setting. As Canada Research Chair in Translational Genomics, Dr. Corey Nislow is trying to answer key questions like: How does the structure and architecture of the genome influence gene expression and cell physiology? Can we use genomic and genome architecture data to understand evolutionary relationships? And how can we apply the tools we develop for model organisms to human biology?

To answer questions like these, Nislow and his research team are working on biotechnology tools, high-throughput cell-based screens, and next-generation sequencing. They want to better understand how the cell takes the instructions in its DNA (that is, its genotype) and manifests that information into phenotype (observable traits) in both normal and abnormal circumstances. Ultimately, they hope to figure out whether it’s possible to combine the power of next-generation sequencing and chemical biology to better understand how gene variants affect patients’ responses to drug treatments.

By 2050, the world’s population is expected to reach 9.7 billion—and if economic growth continues at its current pace, per capita incomes will double. As incomes rise, people tend to consume more resource-intensive products, such as meat and dairy, which produce higher greenhouse gas emissions and require more land and water. Food production is already a key driver of biodiversity loss, deforestation, water scarcity and pollution. As Canada Research Chair in Economic and Environmental Interactions, Dr. Frederik Noack is searching for ways to reduce the environmental impact of food production.

He and his research team are exploring the impact of aquaculture on wild fish stocks and how technological innovations in agriculture affect the environment. They are also studying the consequences of biodiversity loss for agricultural and forest production and the impact of conservation policies on economic and environmental outcomes. Ultimately, their findings will lead to a new understanding of the economic and environmental interactions around food production.

Extreme events—whether floods, heat waves, droughts or financial market crashes—pose significant risks across multiple sectors. However, predicting them accurately is challenging. As Canada Research Chair in Statistics of Extremes and Risk, Dr. Natalia Nolde is developing advanced statistical methods to improve our ability to model and assess the risk of extreme events and help decision-makers anticipate and mitigate their impacts.

Nolde and her research team are creating more flexible, realistic models that can handle complex, multivariate datasets and ensuring they can be applied to diverse fields, such as climate science, finance and public health. By refining risk assessment tools, their research will support stronger decision-making strategies and enhance Canada’s resilience to extreme environmental and financial events.

Cultural mismatch happens when customs and traditions that affect human behaviour adjust more slowly than would be optimal in a given environment. Mismatch is a potentially helpful explanation for the deeply held differences in values and beliefs that we increasingly see around issues like religion, immigration, race, gun rights, the role of government and more.

As Canada Research Chair in Economics of Culture, Dr. Nathan Nunn is looking at the extent to which people’s views on issues like these are shaped by history and may be suboptimal for the holder, given the current setting. By studying the origins and evolution of cultural practices, local context and social structures, he and his research team aim to better understand the importance of these elements for economic outcomes today.

Even though cervical cancer is almost entirely preventable with HPV vaccination and screening, the World Health Organization estimates that one million women around the world are currently affected. In Canada alone, an estimated 1,300 Canadian women were diagnosed with cervical cancer in 2019, and every day, a woman in Canada will die from it.

As Canada Research Chair in Global Control of HPV-Related Disease and Cancer, Dr. Gina Ogilvie is defining the best approaches for HPV screening and vaccination to guide policy and clinical care to eliminate cervical cancer around the world. She and her research team are looking at the durability of a single dose of vaccine and methods to improve HPV vaccine uptake. They are also studying the long-term impact of HPV testing and self-collection HPV testing. Ultimately, they aim to accelerate Canada’s efforts to become the first country to eliminate cervical cancer and to share their findings with global partners.

Men have higher incidences of certain health problems, and vulnerable subgroups of men can face unique health inequities. To help address these, Dr. John Oliffe, Canada Research Chair in Men’s Health Promotion, is exploring how to improve men’s physical and mental health (and that of their families) by studying three major health issues: men’s depression and suicide, tobacco use and smoking, and prostate cancer.

Oliffe and his research team are addressing health inequities in vulnerable male sub-groups. The knowledge they generate will inform the design, implementation and evaluation of community-based and e-health interventions for men while guiding clinical practice and policy. 

Canada has struggled with an opioid crisis for a number of years. A particular challenge when it comes to treatment is that sufferers come from a wide variety of backgrounds, so there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Dr. Eugenia Oviedo-Joekes, Canada Research Chair in Person Centred Innovation in Addictions and Public Health, is investigating how our health-care systems can best address the diverse range of people who struggle with opioid use.

The fact that the opioid crisis has continued even though access to medications and harm reduction programs have been greatly expanded highlights the need for more innovative treatment options. Oviedo-Joekes and her research team hope to pioneer new approaches, such as injectable opioid agonist treatments. Their work also recognizes the need to adapt programs to improve treatment uptake and effectiveness for each individual.

What causes cancer to develop and progress? As Canada Research Chair in Integrative Causality Inference of Cancer Mechanisms, Dr. Yongjin Park is trying to find answers to this question by applying genetic analysis and single-cell genomics techniques.

He and his research team are taking a causal machine learning approach to characterize cancer-causing cellular contexts. They are also refining multi-gene (polygenic) risk prediction models to improve the ability to detect cancer early and predict how it will progress. They believe that a causal inference approach in single-cell genomics—enabled by statistical genetics, regulatory genomics, and Bayesian machine learning—holds considerable potential for precision health. Ultimately, their research will enable data-driven cancer diagnoses and suggest potential new drug targets and treatments.

Oral cancer has one of the lowest five-year survival rates among major cancers, mainly because it is difficult to predict which early oral lesions will progress to cancer. Current diagnostic tools cannot reliably identify high-risk cases, leading to both overtreatment and missed opportunities for early intervention. As Canada Research Chair in Oral Cancer Research, Dr. Catherine Poh is developing a powerful new test to transform how oral precancerous lesions are assessed and managed.

Drawing on a uniquely annotated sample bank, she and her research team are combining genomic sequencing with advanced imaging to uncover the molecular changes linked to cancer progression. By integrating multi-omic data, they aim to develop actionable biomarkers that distinguish high-risk lesions from benign ones. This will enable personalized treatment plans that reduce unnecessary interventions and improve survival. Ultimately, their work will advance precision medicine in cancer prevention.

Global awareness of the impact humans are having on the world’s climate and the environment is at an all-time high. We need solutions from every arena—but especially from the industries that have the greatest impact.

The transportation sector was Canada’s second-largest source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2016, accounting for a full quarter of total national emissions. If we want to move away from a fossil-fuel economy, we need to increase the viability of alternative-fuel and zero emissions vehicles and make it safer to transport fossil fuels. Dr. Warren Poole’s research addresses both of these needs.

As Canada Research Chair in Through Process Modelling of Advanced Structural Materials, Poole is driving Canada toward a more sustainable future by developing lighter, stronger aluminum and magnesium alloys and stronger steel alloys for transportation and natural resource transport. Using digital technologies to simulate and test these novel materials’ properties and responses during manufacture, Poole and his research team are lowering risk, test times and costs. They also aim to shrink commercialization time from 10 years to three, bringing innovative solutions to market faster.

Poole’s research is supporting solutions the world needs right now, including lighter-weight conventional vehicles, longer-range alternative-fuel vehicles, safer rides for passengers across the whole of the transportation sector, and stronger, safer pipelines. Initiatives like these will decrease fossil-fuel use, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and lead to more jobs, more highly qualified advanced materials engineers, and greater competitiveness globally for Canada.

Research involves: Using process modelling (virtual simulation) of advanced structural materials to produce lighter-weight automobiles and stronger pipelines more quickly and efficiently.

Research relevance: This research will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, make our transition from fossil fuels safer, and speed up the production and uptake of alternate-fuel vehicles.
 

Research involves: Using social science research to create theatre performances designed to provoke dialogue about global care work.

Research relevance: This research will stimulate informed, transnational, public debate about global care work and the immigration of low-skilled labour migrants to Canada.
 

Metals are a critical part of the technologies that are powering the ongoing energy transition. But in high concentrations, they can pose risks to ecosystems and human health. Understanding how metals move through the Earth system is key to managing both their use and their environmental impact. Dr. Julie Prytulak, Canada Research Chair in Isotope Geochemistry, is investigating metal cycling at both deep-Earth and surface levels—from the formation of metal-rich deposits to the movement of metals through water, soil and sediments.

Using cutting-edge mass spectrometry, she and her research team are tracing metal sources and pathways through their isotopic signatures (the relative proportions of certain isotopes in a sample). They are also advancing new techniques that require far smaller samples than ever before, enabling more precise and sustainable analysis. Their findings will help identify critical metal resources, improve environmental monitoring, and support the safe, responsible use of metals.

Targeted, practical and effective nutrition interventions are key to reducing the burden of chronic diseases, including obesity. As Canada Research Chair in Nutrition and Energy Metabolism in Chronic Disease, Dr. Sarah Purcell is testing the hypothesis that certain chronic diseases have unique physiological, psychological and behavioural characteristics that affect people’s energy intake requirements and their responses to fluctuations in energy levels.

She and her research team hope their findings will help fill critical knowledge gaps in the design of new evidence-based nutrition interventions for people with chronic diseases. Their work will also support knowledge translation and help train the next generation of health researchers and practitioners. 

Much research has focused on understanding how and when judgments made by artificial intelligence (AI) systems are likely to be biased. Discussions have focused on how to design systems and policies to minimize the negative effects of such biases—but comparatively little attention has been paid to bringing the human side of the equation to bear on how to implement and regulate AI. We continue to lack a common framework for understanding the value of human expertise to our well-being.

As Canada Research Chair in Artificial Intelligence, Well-Being and Ethics, Dr. Madeleine Ransom is analyzing the nature of human expertise and bias. This analysis will enable Ransom and her research team to develop a common framework for human and machine bias. It will also deepen our understanding of the role of expertise in well-being and how this should shape our relationship to work. Ultimately, their research will contribute to public policy on human-AI integration.

As the world continues to warm and its population grows, fishing systems are failing ecologically and socially. This is leading to the collapse of culturally significant fisheries and the eruption of fisheries-based conflicts. As Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Fisheries Science, Dr. Andrea Reid is trying to develop solutions based on Indigenous approaches that have underpinned sustainable and adaptive fisheries management for millennia.

Guided by Etuaptmumk (two-eyed seeing), she and her research team are combining Indigenous and western sciences by pairing experimental fisheries methodologies with statistical inference tools. With a focus on Indigenous salmon fisheries, they are working to quantify efficacy, assess climate-related disruptions, and develop model scenarios to support fisheries decision-making. Their work may establish Etuaptmumk as a transformative approach to resolving conservation conflicts.

Socio-economic marginalization, such as from poverty or unemployment, is one of the triggers for substance use. But the dynamics of this type of social exclusion are not fully understood, and strategies to address them among people who use drugs are both exceptionally rare and urgently needed. As Canada Research Chair in Social Inclusion and Health Equity, Dr. Lindsey Richardson is trying to develop some.

Linking observational, intervention and research participation studies, she and her research team are exploring the connection between socio-economic marginalization and health equity. They are also working on an integrated knowledge translation and exchange strategy to bolster this research. They want to ensure it will be relevant to communities and have the maximum possible impact on public policy.

Children who are missing teeth face a range of potential problems—from chewing, choking and digestion hazards to self-esteem issues related to their appearance. As a pediatric dental clinician-scientist and Canada Research Chair in Craniofacial and Dental Development, Dr. Joy Richman is trying to improve children’s oral health.

She and her research team hope to discover the environmental factors that protect fetuses from developing craniofacial abnormalities, such as cleft lips. They are using chicken embryos for this work, in part because these can be accessed directly through windows in their shells. The team’s other goal is to define the cellular and molecular basis of permanent tooth formation. Ultimately, Richman and her team hope their discoveries will improve children’s lives by leading to new therapies for teeth that never come in or are lost to accident or disease. 

Microglia act as the first and main form of immune defense in the central nervous system. Located throughout the brain and spinal cord, they scavenge for pathogens, plaques, damaged neurons and any other changes that could harm the central nervous system. Recent scientific advances have highlighted the importance of these resident defenders to normal brain development. But a fundamental question that remains is whether a similar developmental role takes place in other regions of the body as embryos develop, including craniofacial tissues.

As Canada Research Chair in Immune Regulation of Developmental Programs, Dr. Jessica Rosin is focusing on the role that macrophages (a type of white blood cell) and osteoclasts (a type of cell that breaks down bone tissue) play in the development of the upper face. She and her research team are investigating whether signals from these immune cells during the first eight weeks of gestation contribute to normal craniofacial development. Their findings will shed light on how maternal diseases and illnesses experienced during pregnancy may disrupt the normal development of the fetus.

The conventional concept of labour law uses a narrow lens and explains work as a private contract. In contrast, Dr. Supriya Routh, Canada Research Chair in Labour Law and Social Justice, is developing a “public” rationale for the regulation of work that takes its inspiration from social justice—and takes human diversity seriously.

He and his research team are working on a more expansive conceptualization of labour law that supports innovative regulatory interventions for a range of working arrangements—including unpaid care and socio-ecologically beneficial work, such as sustainable agriculture, water management and waste recycling. They are focusing on how regulation can promote better opportunities for workers to earn a living under fair conditions. This includes looking at why a range of activities are excluded from the traditional account of labour and employment law. Ultimately, their work will bridge local challenges with global debates.

Among the most important drug molecules in use today are organic compounds that have been isolated from organisms like bacteria, plants and fungi. Known in science as “natural products,” these compounds include antibiotics and anti-cancer drugs—and they have an incredible diversity of chemical structures and biological activities. Somehow, living organisms synthesize these complex molecules without any of the advantages of an organic chemist, such as access to high temperatures and solvents.

As Canada Research Chair in Biosynthetic Enzymes, Dr. Katherine Ryan aims to understand how these natural products are assembled in order to use this knowledge to discover new drugs and biocatalysts. Understanding the chemical biology of pathogenic and beneficial bacteria will enable Ryan and her research team to make significant contributions to health research.

The Middle East is a hub for the circulation of global capital—but it is also characterized by financial turmoil that can lead to instability on an international scale. As Canada Research Chair in the History of the Modern Middle East, Dr. Hicham Safieddine is examining the role of financial governance and central banking culture in major conflicts and crises in the Middle East from World War I to today.

Using an interdisciplinary framework and diverse methodologies, he and his research team are attempting to decolonize financial history and globalize Middle East studies. Ultimately, their findings will support policy recommendations, educational resources and financial reform.

RNA viruses are those that use ribonucleic acid rather than DNA as their genetic material and rely on host cells to replicate and produce new viral particles. RNA viruses like hepatitis C, dengue and Zika represent significant threats to global health, accounting for more than a quarter of all emerging infectious diseases. But we still don’t know how these viruses coordinate and regulate their activities to accumulate within their hosts.

As Canada Research Chair in RNA Biology and Viral Infections, Dr. Selena Sagan aims to address this knowledge gap. She and her research team are shedding light on the virus-host interactions that support the life cycles of RNA viruses. To do this, they are examining the properties of viral proteins and RNA as well as how they both behave in live cells during infection. Ultimately, their findings will advance our understanding of viral RNA accumulation and provide new antiviral interventions for both human and veterinary pathogens.

Every year, collisions on Canadian roads lead to approximately 120,000 injuries and 1,900 fatalities. Yet current road safety management practices remain largely reactive, relying on crashes and injuries that have already occurred to identify hazardous locations in need of intervention. Addressing this ethical and practical challenge is the focus of Dr. Tarek Sayed, Canada Research Chair in Road Safety.

Dr. Sayed and his research team are transforming the way road safety is assessed and managed by developing innovative methods and applications that proactively and dynamically evaluate safety using surrogate measures, or “near misses.” Their work leverages advanced computer vision technologies, behavioral econometrics, and road user trajectory analysis to identify conflicts and risk indicators before serious collisions occur.

By shifting the focus from reacting to existing safety problems to proactively planning and designing inherently safer transportation systems, the team aims to fundamentally change road safety management practices in Canada and around the world.

Energy-efficient and clean technologies for preparing chemicals that contain nitrogen are in high demand for the manufacture of drugs, agricultural products and plastics. Nitrogen is incorporated into many biologically active compounds and can offer routes to access smart materials that respond to their environment.

Achieving these goals requires the development of catalysts. Catalysts promote chemical reactions, but are chemically unchanged at the end of the reactions. As Canada Research Chair in Catalyst Development, Dr. Laurel Schafer is developing catalysts that selectively incorporate nitrogen into products while ensuring that all atoms in the starting materials are also incorporated, leading to no waste.

Furthermore, Schafer and her research team are realizing these goals by working with metals of low toxicity that are easily modified and rapidly assembled. These reactive compounds can be used in fine chemical, petrochemical, pharmaceutical and agrochemical industries.

She and her team are also exploring new catalysts and synthetic approaches for a variety of applications, such as preparing self-healing and adhesive plastics and generating new drugs for treating chronic pain.

Schafer’s sustainable solutions will change the way important industrial chemical products are made. Through her research, simple and abundant products from the oil and gas sector—or naturally occurring extractives from waste forestry and agricultural products—can be converted to high-value nitrogen-containing materials and molecules using cost-effective, environmentally friendly catalytic methods.

Research involves: Developing sustainable catalytic technologies for preparing nitrogen-containing, biologically active small molecules and responsive, functional materials.

Research relevance: This research will lead to new catalytic technologies that create agrochemical and pharmaceutical building blocks from simple petrochemicals while reducing waste and energy use.
 

Organic chemistry plays a critical role in the development of new drugs to treat a range of human diseases. As Canada Research Chair in Synthetic Solutions for Bioactive Compounds, Dr. Corinna Shindler is supporting this work by developing new methods for synthesizing complex, biologically significant molecules.

She and her research team have already contributed to the design of synthetic techniques that can provide rapid access to the new molecular frameworks needed to design and develop drugs. Now, they are developing strategies to synthesize complex molecules that target cancer-related inflammation as well as Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria that causes tuberculosis. Shindler and her team are focusing on improving carbon-carbon bond formation between alkenes (molecules that contain a double bond between two carbon atoms) and carbonyls (carbon atoms double-bonded to oxygen atoms) or imines (compounds derived from ammonia where one of the hydrogen atoms has been replaced by a carbon group) to create new bioactive compounds.

The goal of precision oncology is to develop cancer treatments that target the characteristics of an individual’s tumour to ensure the best possible outcome. Dr. Kasmintan Schrader, Canada Research Chair in Clinical Cancer Genetics and Genomics, is using precision oncology to improve the use of germline variation to enhance cancer care. (Germline variations, also called germline mutations, are gene changes in an egg or sperm that are incorporated into the DNA of every cell in an embryo. Variants are passed on from parents to offspring.)

Most technological advances in precision cancer medicine have focused on treating cancer and detecting recurrent disease. Schrader and his research team are trying to better detect hereditary cancer, differentiate hereditary from non-hereditary forms of cancer, detect cancer earlier, and uncover germline variations that may not only increase susceptibility to cancer, but provide valuable information to patients, families and caregivers.

Canada is home to myriad fish species that have important commercial, recreational and cultural value. But human activities and climate change threaten these species. As Canada Research Chair in Responses of Fish to a Changing Environment, Dr. Patricia Schulte is using techniques from genomics, epigenomics, biochemistry and physiology to understand what makes fish species (or individuals within a species) vulnerable or resilient to environmental change.

She and her research team want to learn more about the genetic differences that may contribute to resilience. They are examining the epigenetic mechanisms that help fish species adapt to changing environments. They will use the knowledge they gain to make conservation hatcheries better at supporting wild fish populations and to increase the efficiency, sustainability and resilience of aquaculture operations and reduce pressures on wild fish. Ultimately, their work will contribute to the scientific knowledge needed to preserve Canada’s fish resources into the future.

Cell therapies involve transplanting living cells into the body and have the potential to treat a variety of intractable diseases. Pluripotent stem cells (PSCs) are key to producing cell therapies, because they enable cells to “expand”—or make copies of themselves—and “differentiate” to give rise to all cell types. As a result, PSCs are widely thought to be an unlimited source of cells for manufacturing off-the-shelf cell therapies.

Dr. Nika Shakiba, Canada Research Chair in Cellular Engineering, is developing strategies to overcome challenges in the manufacture of large quantities of high-quality PSCs and generating cell therapies by converting PSCs into specialized cell types. To do this, she and her research team are applying synthetic biology tools and engineering principles to uncover the underlying rules that govern PSC expansion and differentiation. They will use this knowledge to devise new technologies for off-the-shelf production of safe, cost-effective cell therapies.

Dr. Sadia Shirazi’s Canada Research Chair in History of South Asian Art, Architecture, and Visual Culture integrates art history with postcolonial and black thought to develop decolonial methodologies, epistemologies, and curatorial praxis for writing histories of marginalized artists. Moving beyond the cartographies and spatial binaries of the nation as a bounded territorial geography and the diaspora, as a stable figure, the research situates the work of artists from across the Indian subcontinent and its diasporas within a constellation of meeting points across the world. From Indian ocean networks that precede colonialism, to the post-independence movement of artists from the former colonies, to colonial metropoles during the era of decolonization, this research bridges the postwar and postcolonial eras and the global north and south while destabilizing the figure of the nation and diaspora. Incorporating insights from gender and sexuality studies and postcolonial, indigenous and black thought, the work addresses questions of race, caste, religion, gender, migration and diaspora.

In confronting absences in archival records, the program develops innovative methods for working with missing or fragmented archives and fosters reciprocal, community-engaged knowledge production and public programs. Through workshops, oral histories, exhibitions, performances, sonic archives and other multimedia outputs, research is generated collaboratively with artists and communities and shared across global networks. By foregrounding historical erasures and supporting reparative scholarship and curatorial practice, the program advances decolonial approaches to the study of underrepresented, racialized artists while contributing to interdisciplinary scholarship, praxis-based pedagogy and relational knowledge creation.

Computer vision is a field that studies the use of computers to automatically perceive and understand visual content in order to make predictions or inform decisions. A key component of computer vision is learning: it enables the acquisition of sophisticated models of the visual world from large images.

As Canada Research Chair in Computer Vision and Machine Learning, Dr. Leonid Sigal is studying some of the fundamental challenges associated with computer vision. These include learning from limited, structured and/or multi-modal data (images plus descriptive text and sound) and developing new neural architectures and objectives. Sigal and his research team plan to use their discoveries to come up with solutions for applications in data curation, content creation, augmented reality and medicine.

Research involves: Developing machine learning algorithms that help computers perceive, understand and reason about visual content.

Research relevance: This research will lead to the development of tools and algorithms that are necessary for visual intelligence.

The overall goal of Dr. Don Sin’s Chair research is to develop biomarkers of disease activity that can be used to target the right therapies to the right patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and thereby enable precision medicine. Sin will use “–omics” technology, accompanied by state-of-the-art bioinformatics and statistics, to discover –omics signatures. Sin will use the signatures to predict and subphenotype COPD exacerbations. His will then develop the signatures into blood or sputum tests, for clinical implementation. During this term as Chair, Sin will clinically implement one or two major biomarker tests, as well as create large COPD exacerbation cohorts, research networks and collaborations. These will be a legacy for future COPD researchers in Canada.

Research involves: Studying the societal and personal impact of chronic obstructive lung disease, specifically the role of inhaled corticosteroids in the treatment of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and the link between COPD and heart disease.

Research relevance: The research involves studying the medication use and outcomes of patients with COPD

Health workers play a key role in delivering health services to their communities—and health workforce policies can ensure that we have the right number and mix of health care providers and skills to meet communities’ needs. As Canada Research Chair in Global Health Policy, Dr. Veena Sriram is examining the politics of health workforce policy processes and the impact of these processes on population health.

She and her research team are exploring how power and politics shape health workforce policy processes and ultimately affect equitable access to health care services. They are focusing on two themes: the role of protests by health workers in shaping health workforce policy, and the politics of emergency care workforce policy and its impact on people’s access to emergency care. Their findings will strengthen health workforce policy and health systems governance, ultimately leading to greater health equity in Canada and globally.

Sustainable ocean management involves taking a knowledge-based approach to planning and managing how we use our oceans in order to protect marine ecosystems while achieving a sustainable ocean economy. Dr. Rashid Sumila, Canada Research Chair in Interdisciplinary Ocean and Fisheries Economics, is studying the economic causes behind—and the impacts of—changes in coastal and marine ecosystems in order to support sustainable ocean management.

Sumaila is studying the effects of climate change on how shared fish stocks are managed and trying to determine how ocean deoxygenation is likely to affect biodiversity (and the people who depend on it) in the north Pacific Ocean. He and his research team are also examining the scope, magnitude and types of subsidies available to the aquaculture sector and how they may affect both the sector’s economic efficiency and the sustainability of global fisheries.

Recent advances in single-cell biotechnologies have greatly enhanced our ability to perform high-throughput molecular, functional and structural profiling of individual cells. This work is generating vast amounts of diverse data, but we don’t yet know how to effectively interpret these data to understand cellular behaviour in different biological contexts. Dr. Xin Tang, Canada Research Chair in Computational Cell Biology, aims to develop predictive, explainable and biologically informed artificial intelligence (AI) models to analyze single-cell data and uncover the principles that govern how cells function and interact.

By creating computational frameworks (such as virtual cells) and using AI agents that simulate how cells respond, he and his research team are building models that can analyze and interpret complex single-cell data across multiple types of biological data. Their findings will shed light on fundamental mechanisms in cell biology, systems biology, neuroscience and brain-computer interfaces, ultimately supporting biomedical breakthroughs.

Stem cell-based therapies hold great promise for addressing diseases that afflict millions of Canadians, including many forms of cancer, muscular and neurological degenerative disorders, diabetes and arthritis. But a lack of understanding of basic stem cell biology has hindered the proper application of stem cell therapy and led to the proliferation of unproven and potentially unsafe uses in private clinics.

Dr. Sheila Teves, Canada Research Chair in Mechanisms of Gene Regulation, aims to remedy this by studying how embryonic stem cells are able to maintain themselves indefinitely while also retaining the ability to differentiate into any cell type of the body. Using cutting-edge technologies such as gene editing, genomics and single-molecule imaging, she and her research team plan to dissect the molecular underpinnings that make stem cells such versatile therapeutic agents. Ultimately, their research will lead to potential breakthroughs in stem cell biology and its potential for therapy.

Intersectionality is a way to understand the multiple disadvantages that a person may face. For example, a racialized older woman may face discrimination at work based on her race, gender and age. Intersectional risk and resilience factors can contribute to the development of psychological distress. As Canada Research Chair in Mental Health Equity, Dr. Lianne Tomfohr-Madsen is using clinical and counselling psychology, health psychology and public health approaches to understand these factors and find ways to reduce the distress.

She and her research team are exploring psychological interventions to improve parent and child mental health. They are trying to identify the types of psychological support provided through mobile devices that can best engage patients from traditionally under-served groups. They also hope to shift public policy to make mental health services more accessible and to find ways to recruit and train more diverse, culturally competent clinician scientists.

A major challenge in urban planning is understanding and quantifying the potential impacts of infrastructure build—such as highways, bridges, airports and railways—on human health, the environment and climate change. Investments in urban transport and housing can create jobs and improve equity and health outcomes. But they are also major sources of carbon emissions and can reinforce or exacerbate existing social inequalities. 

As Canada Research Chair in Computational Urban Science and Planning, Dr. Martino Tran is deepening our understanding of how human mobility is interdependent with essential urban services. He and his research team are developing methods to evaluate interactions between vulnerable populations, urban transport networks, and access to services. Their aim is to develop Canada’s first municipal-scale infrastructure modelling framework to assess interdependencies between the housing and transport sectors. They are also quantifying the potential impacts of pursuing climate change, health and social equity policy goals.

The health of your gut is closely connected to the tiny organisms that live inside it. These organisms are collectively called microbiota (or your microbiome)—and more than 20 million Canadians suffer from digestive disorders in which these gut microbiota are implicated. Interactions between the human body and its microbiota affect abiotic (non-living) factors in the gut, like acidity, temperature, oxygen levels and more. In turn, changes in the gut environment due to disease dramatically affect gut bacteria. But unfortunately, we know little about how these changes work.

As Canada Research Chair in Quantitative Microbiota Biology for Health Applications, Dr. Carolina Tropini is studying the connections between the gut microbiota, gut microenvironment and disease. She and her research team are trying to identify the mechanisms that underlie bacterial survival or constrain bacterial species within altered abiotic environments. Ultimately, their work will support the bioengineering of next-generation treatments based on microbiota.

As we have all learned during the COVID-19 pandemic, how we communicate about international health can have a significant influence on people’s behaviours and the resulting outcomes for communities and countries. Clear, competent, consistent communications are critical in health care and deserve close attention.

Dr. Heidi Tworek, Canada Research Chair in History and Policy of Health Communications, is examining the history and policy of international health communications, particularly during epidemics. She and her research team are building an interdisciplinary scholarly network around health communications and using the latest techniques in big data research to understand how previous epidemics were communicated. Ultimately, they will make concrete recommendations for improving health outcomes in Canada and abroad.

Quantum computers use a completely new computing approach that allows them to tackle certain problems much faster than traditional computers can. As Canada Research Chair in Quantum Computing, Dr. Daochen Wang is developing algorithms that take full advantage of quantum computing’s unique capabilities, particularly for problems that can benefit from significant speed improvements.

His and his research team are exploring which types of problems are best suited for quantum solutions, creating new methods for designing quantum algorithms. They are also assessing the impact of quantum computing in three main areas: code-breaking (cryptanalysis), improving artificial intelligence (reinforcement learning), and advancing research in the natural sciences. By rigorously evaluating the potential and limitations of quantum computing, Wang’s team aims to shed light on how quantum technology can help solve real-world challenges and where it can offer the most meaningful advantages.

Finding cancer in its earliest stages can significantly improve a patient’s prognosis and quality of life. As Canada Research Chair in Oncology, Dr. Karla Williams is working on new ways to detect and diagnose cancer accurately and to discover better treatments.

She and her research team are studying the use of small particles, called extracellular vesicles, to detect and report on cancer. They are also trying to identify new molecular targets that could be pursued to prevent cancer from spreading and to successfully treat it once it has. They are developing non-invasive, blood-based tests to support early cancer detection and learn more about how tumours grow and spread (metastasize). Overall, their work could lead to new ways to detect, diagnose and treat cancers.

Research involves: Defining the key mechanisms that regulate cancer cell metastasis and developing cancer diagnostics though small-particle analysis.

Research relevance: This research could lead to new cancer treatments as well as diagnostic tools to direct patient treatment.

Climate change is reshaping Canadian ecosystems. In theory, one of the most-reported impacts—longer growing seasons (because of earlier springs)—should increase plant growth and carbon storage because of the additional time available to absorb sunlight and nutrients. However, many studies have found that longer growing seasons do not necessarily result in more plant growth. This poses challenges for predicting the impacts of climate change.

As Canada Research Chair in Temporal Ecology, Dr. Elizabeth Wolkovich is testing how and when longer seasons increase plant growth and examining why some plants do not grow more with longer growing seasons. She and her research team are combining climate change science with biological models of plant growth to better understand the complexities of growing season length and plant growth across species, life stages and continents. Ultimately, their work will improve the accuracy of predictions about how climate change may affect temperate and boreal forests.

All large Canadian cities have low-income neighbourhoods in which poverty, mental illness and drug addiction cause substantial health and community concerns. Ethnic minorities, the homeless, the drug-addicted and street-involved youth are among the particularly vulnerable inner-city populations. Chronic diseases like hepatitis C and HIV, related disorders resulting from drug addiction and other poverty-associated conditions, result in substantial morbidity and mortality and boost healthcare costs. Dr. Evan Wood, Canada Research Chair in Inner City Medicine, seeks to help some of society’s most vulnerable citizens by guiding the response to these longstanding health and social challenges. Wood is investigating and addressing complex medical and public health challenges that have long troubled policy-makers aiming to address inner city health needs. His research will make it easier to provide unique approaches to address common health concerns like drug addiction and HIV/AIDS that present a broad public health challenge. Wood’s research will lead to the development of evidence-based approaches for treating drug addiction and preventing the ongoing spread of costly, infectious diseases like HIV/AIDS. The outcome will be improved public health resulting from strategies for unclogging inner city emergency rooms and reducing healthcare costs.

Research involves: Investigating and addressing the complex health issues facing inner cities.

Research relevance: This research will improve strategies to address health issues stemming from poverty, mental illness and drug addiction.
 

Historically, Canada and Hong Kong have enjoyed a long-standing and close relationship. In fact, Hong Kong is home to one of the largest Canadian diasporas abroad, with an estimated 300,000 Canadian citizens and some 200 Canadian companies. As Canada Research Chair in Hong Kong Studies, Dr. Helena Wu aims to foster productive engagement between Canada and Hong Kong culture and society.

She and her research team are pursuing two interlocking projects. In one, they are exploring how creative expression and audience activities affect cultural (industry) practices, the construction of identity and the relationships between content producers, distributors and spectators (and vice versa) in post-millennial Hong Kong. In the other, they are conducting a knowledge exchange project to collect, preserve and revisualize place-based, community-bonding experiences and memories in post-millennial Hong Kong. They are using digital cartography, online collections and a community-academic partnership to accomplish this. Ultimately, their research will bridge the exploration of diaspora, identity and belonging in different fields and across diverse communities.

Concussions are extremely common, but unlike other musculoskeletal injuries, they are invisible and often under-reported. Athletes in contact sports are at higher risk, and a growing number of studies are finding that those who sustain repeated head impacts may experience long-term brain consequences. Yet the mechanism of this brain injury is still poorly understood.

Wearable sensors are a promising tool that can gather human data from real-world head impacts and brain injuries, but the technology and research are still limited. As Canada Research Chair in Wearable Brain Injury Sensing, Dr. Lyndia (Chun) Wu is tackling the problem of quantifying on-field sensor noise. She and her research team are also gathering high-quality, large-scale head impact exposure data from a wide range of athletes and developing a novel sensor toolkit to examine brain changes. Their research will provide insight into brain injury mechanisms and support the development of innovative tools for monitoring brain trauma.

Starting from a fertilized egg, cells multiply, undergo functional changes, and form diverse tissue structures. Throughout this process, intracellular and environmental cues trigger patterns of gene expression that govern cell state transitions. These transitions, in turn, produce new signals that guide cells to self-organize into functional clusters within distinct areas. As Canada Research Chair in Synthetic Biology, Dr. Nozomu Yachie is looking for better ways to study these complex processes.

Most biological studies require researchers to destroy samples to observe molecular and cellular details—an approach that limits our ability to understand dynamic processes. To overcome this obstacle, Yachie and his research team are developing two cell engineering approaches: a video camera system and a time machine-like system to observe dynamic molecular and cellular events as they unfold in the body. By combining these tools, they aim to support the development of new treatments for diseases such as cancer. 

Quantum computing has the potential to change the world, but there’s a challenge: these powerful computers are easily disturbed by their surroundings. This is known as the decoherence problem. One way to reduce decoherence is to use special states within certain types of superconductors (materials that can conduct electric current with no resistance below a certain critical temperature). But until recently, these have tended to work only at very low temperatures. Now, a theory has emerged about a new type of structure—called a twisted cuprate structure—that has the potential to perform as a superconductor at higher temperatures.

As Canada Research Chair in Two-dimensional Quantum Materials, Dr. Ziliang Ye plans to create and study these structures to see if they can maintain these special states at higher temperatures. If he and his research team succeed, the results could be a game-changer for quantum computing and make these powerful computers more practical and accessible.

Research involves: Probing the electronic structure and optical properties of two-dimensional (2D) materials using light.

Research relevance: This research will provide deeper insight into 2D materials and support improved technologies, such as smarter computers, faster Internet and new wearable electronic devices.

Endometriosis affects more than one million Canadian women, and is a common cause of infertility and pelvic pain (such as menstrual cramps), dyspareunia (painful sexual activity) and other chronic pain. It is often treated with hormonal medications and surgery.

Dr. Paul Yong, Canada Research Chair in Endometriosis and Pelvic Pain, aims to better understand the causes of pain for women with endometriosis. He and his research team are identifying clinical factors that can predict pain-related quality of life and health-system use after endometriosis surgery. They are also evaluating whether biomarkers can help with these predictions. Their findings will be used to create a tool to help patients and clinicians decide on the optimal timing and type of endometriosis surgery. Ultimately, their research will further the understanding of endometriosis-associated pain and how to treat it so as to avoid unnecessary or repeated surgeries.

To better understand the impacts of air pollution and climate change on human health, we need to comprehend the complex connections between all three, including the roles played by policies. Low-cost sensors and mobile monitoring techniques are an innovative way to collect air quality data. As Canada Research Chair in Canada Research Chair in Real-World Air Quality Sensing, Dr. Naomi Zimmerman is using these tools to assess the effects of environmental technologies and policy decisions on air pollution and climate change.

She and her research team are quantifying the impacts of decarbonization strategies on the movement of goods and developing algorithms for optimizing low-cost sensors. They are also characterizing the effects of wildfire smoke by developing real-world, in vitro exposure systems and measuring multi-pollutant infiltration rates in community clean air spaces. Their research aims to help address air pollution by integrating health, environmental and climate considerations.

New targeted therapies to treat cancer have undoubtedly helped many patients to live longer. However, these treatments are still just palliative, and do not offer a cure. Because of a cancer feature known as “cell plasticity,” which enables cancer cells to survive or change their identities, patients can progress to highly aggressive and deadly forms of cancer that do not resemble the original ones.

Dr. Amina Zoubeidi, Canada Research Chair in Cancer Therapy Resistance, is trying to tackle this problem. Using state-of-the art tools and approaches to profile patients’ tumours and blood, Zoubeidi and her research team are developing liquid biomarkers to identify and monitor plasticity and design novel drugs to address it. Ultimately, they hope their research will lead to treatments that can save lives.

How accurately do tests measure results in multicultural societies—and how fair are they? These are two questions at the heart of research by Dr. Bruno Zumbo, Canada Research Chair in Psychometrics and Measurement.

Zumbo is particularly interested in equity and fairness at the nexus of data science, digital innovation and social justice. He focuses on the social context of test fairness and data science methods for examining fairness. Using survey and test data, he is developing and refining new theories and methods that make the most of multivariate statistics and computational technology advances. Ultimately, his goal is to ensure that measurement practices in education and the social sciences embrace test-takers' diversity and the many ways of being human in Canada’s contemporary multicultural society.

Developmental coordination disorder (DCD) is a common but under-recognized motor disorder that affects more than 450,000 Canadian children. Children who suffer from this disorder find it hard to learn the motor skills they need to perform everyday activities, such as tying shoelaces, using cutlery, writing or riding a bicycle. The cause of this condition is unknown—and it can last a lifetime and affect school performance, vocational and leisure pursuits, self-esteem and mental health.

Dr. Jill Zwicker, Canada Research Chair in Pediatric Brain Development and Rehabilitation, is trying to discover the potential causes of DCD. She and her research team are also evaluating the effects of rehabilitation on motor skill and brain development in children with the condition. Ultimately, they hope to influence clinical care to improve outcomes for children with DCD.