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Provincial grant fuels eight UVic projects
by Maria Lironi
A $9.2 million grant from the provincial government
will help some of UVic’s leading researchers on their way
to new discoveries, including what lies beneath the ocean floor,
how to maintain good quality drinking water, the cause of cancer,
and the future of wireless communications.
“This time last year, the university received
its largest ever grant from the federally funded Canada Foundation
for Innovation for new UVic-based research projects in these areas,”
says UVic President Dr. David Turpin.
“These matching funds ensure that our
nationally and internationally recognized researchers have the facilities
and equipment they require to conduct their work in B.C. Our continued
success in securing research funding speaks to the exceptional quality
of our faculty and their diverse work.”
The funding goes to the following projects:
Dr. Verena Tunnicliffe (biology/ earth & ocean
sciences, Canada Research Chair in deep ocean research) will develop
VENUS (the Victoria Experimental Network UnderSea), a revolutionary,
fibre optic-cabled observatory system to provide real-time data
from the diverse marine environments of Saanich Inlet, and the Georgia
and Juan de Fuca Straits. ($4.1 million)
Dr. Randall Sobie’s (physics & astronomy)
research computing facility will process and store large amounts
of scientific and engineering data, health information and multimedia
objects and will be used by researchers across the nation. ($2.9
million)
Dr. Ned Djilali’s (mechanical engineering) novel
water purification technology, known as centrifugal membrane separation
(CMS), will produce clean, potable water from a variety of sources
where no economic treatment method exists. It will also allow for
the treatment of waste and industrial process waters from a variety
of sources across B.C. and Canada. ($540,000)
Dr. Juan Ausio’s (biochemistry & microbiology)
new lab equipment will allow him to examine the way proteins interact
with each other and with DNA in cells. His discoveries will aid
in the study of infectious diseases, cancer, aquaculture and fish
diseases, and forestry. ($535,000)
Dr. Asit Mazumder’s (biology) regional facility
for interdisciplinary research on drinking water, fisheries and
forestry will apply basic and advanced analytical, modelling and
field tools to the study of the sustainable management of drinking
water, fish productivity, toxic chemicals, forest practices, and
waterborne diseases. ($524,000)
Dr. Frank van Veggel’s (chemistry, Canada Research
Chair in supramolecular photonic materials) new research lab will
be used for the development of leading-edge optical devices and
biolabels—molecules that emit light and sometimes indicate
tumour cell locations—and to determine how signalling occurs
between cells. ($310,000)
Dr. Colin Bradley’s (mechanical engineering,
Canada Research Chair in design and computational modeling) new
experimental facility, the shape adaptive manufacturing laboratory,
will develop a new generation of adaptive manufacturing systems
and machines—or “smart tools”—with the ability
to self-adjust to changing environmental factors. ($158,000)
Dr. Vijay Bhargava’s (electrical engineering,
Canada Research Chair in broadband radio access systems) new computer
equipment will allow him to investigate advanced antenna technologies,
better protection against noise and interference, more efficient
use of the broadband spectrum, methods of access control, and protocols
for better integration of different applications. ($56,000)
To date, UVic has received $13.5 million from the
B.C. Knowledge Development Fund for 23 research projects.
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