Spring sees new federal investments in biosciences at New Brunswick universities

May 20, 2009
NB - Springtime has brought a new wave of investments from the federal granting councils to biosciences programs at New Brunswick universities. These include:

The Canadian Foundation for Innovation Awards:

UNB biologist Gary Saunders, who holds the Canada Research Chair in Molecular Systematics & Biodiversity, received $240,618 for his research, and will use the funding to establish a state-of-the-art genomics facility in support of the International Barcode of Life (iBOL) Marine Initiative. This initiative will create a genetic inventory of all life on Earth and will make it faster to accurately identify biological specimens. Dr. Saunders' research will produce a global seaweed inventory and a comprehensive record of marine life in the Bay of Fundy.
Mount Allison biology professor and Crabtree Research Chair in Aquatic Animal Physiology Dr. Suzie Currie is working to learn more about how environmental issues of climate change and pollution are affecting fish and invertebrates in the waters of Atlantic Canada. The $125,000 to Dr. Currie's project will help fund research in the new Crabtree Aqualab: Centre for Aquatic Sciences, at Mount Allison University. Given Mount Allison's unique coastal location in the Maritimes, Dr. Currie and her team hope to marry field-based aquatic research with laboratory-based studies. The new centre will provide aquatic facilities that reflect real-world changing environmental conditions. The proposed facility will be designed with the capacity to have both flow-through and re-circulating water systems to house large and small-bodied fish as well as invertebrates.

NSERC Strategic Project Grants and New Media Initiative competition

UNB professor Tillmann Benfey, for work on the control of gender in cod. This work will be done in collaboration with partners Cooke Aquaculture, and Fisheries and Oceans Canada.
UNB professor Myriam Barbeau, for work on modeling of a key species (burrow-dwelling amphipods) in the Bay of Fundy ecosystem, in collaboration with partners at Mount Allison University, Carleton University, Environment Canada, the Nature Conservancy of Canada, the Province of New Brunswick, and the NS Department of Natural Resources.
A project initiated by the laboratory of Dr. Peter Krell of the University of Guelph, on novel viral insecticides for forest protection, includes New Brunswick industrial partner Sylvar Technologies.

NSERC Strategic Project Grants (SPG) program - Fisheries and Aquaculture Initiative
As part of a $21.8 million, five year package targeted at fisheries and aquaculture research, funding of $8.8 million over three years distributed through NSERC's Strategic Project Grants (SPG) program, was announced in support of early-stage, project research that has a strong potential to enhance Canada's economy, society or environment within the next decade. Twenty-three projects have been accorded funding, including two UNB (Saint John) projects on validating a recently developed technique as a means of determining the absolute age of crustaceans; and a second project on the biodiversity of shallow rocky subtidal habitats in southwest Bay of Fundy. The latter are valued at approximately $703,000. Twelve Atlantic Canadian projects have been accorded funding of approximately $4.6 million.

NSERC Discovery Grants
This spring's investments include over $820,000 in approximately 32 projects. Full details on the funded projects remain to be announced by the universities.

A recent study by BioAtlantech and its partners identified a robust core of academic research programs in the bio-sciences, representing over 100 faculty members, 135 technicians, 34 post docs and nearly 400 graduate students. Economic activity including salaries, scholarships and research projects totaled nearly $19 million in 2007. The work identified that New Brunswick academics hold 32 patents, plus non-conventional proprietary knowledge, and were involved in 330 research projects, during 2007. New Brunswick has 5 universities, including some of the most revered in Canada.

http://www.unb.ca/news/view.cgi?id=1725
http://www.mta.ca/news/archive_display.php?id=1970
http://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/_doc/Discovery-Decouverte/2009_Stats_e.pdf

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