Canada has given 19 international researchers multimillion-dollar awards to move themselves and their labs to Canadian universities as part of an effort to improve the country's reputation for scientific innovation.
The researchers are the first recipients of Canada Excellence Research Chairs, a program established by the Canadian government to attract scientists from abroad. The winners and the institutions where they will study will receive about $10-million over a seven-year period.
The researchers hail from around the world. Most of them, nine total, are coming from America, including professors from Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The rest are from Brazil, Denmark, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom.
(While geographically diverse, some people have objected to the fact that the winners are all men.)
The announcement of the awards was made on various Canadian campuses Monday, ending a search process for what many researchers privately called the "uber chairs," after the federal government started the program two years ago.
"Simply put, Canada had to become more than ever a magnet for talent," said Industry Minister Tony Clement at the University of Toronto, which will be home to two of the winners.
In all, 13 Canadian universities got the Excellence Research Chairs. The University of Alberta will house the most, with four. It took a strategic approach, seeing the competition as a chance to build on its existing areas of excellence and to address Canada's future needs.
The university "used the caliber of our candidates to leverage additional money from other sources," said Indira Samarasekera, the president of the University of Alberta. The Alberta government put up an additional $50-million, she said, and Hong Kong philanthropist Li Ka Shing contributed $27-million for a new virology institute where one of the new chairs will work.
While most of the universities with the new chairs are large institutions with tens of thousands of students, the University of Prince Edward Island, with about 4,000 students, is also in the group. The arrival of the new researcher will help the university build on its strength in animal health and aquatic ecosystems, said Wade MacLauchlan, the university's president.
"Ian Gardner, who comes from the University of California at Davis, will concentrate on research that responds to the growing demand for healthy fish from healthy waters," he said. "It's all about high-quality protein for a hungry planet."
Comments
1. nsflibrary2 - May 18, 2010 at 05:22 pm
Incredible. Nineteen outstanding scientists and not a single woman.
2. meduxnekeag - May 19, 2010 at 01:24 am
@nsflibrary2. That is incredible. And, with a couple of exceptions, entirely white men. plus ca change plus c'est la meme chose.
3. raymond_j_ritchie - May 19, 2010 at 05:10 am
Good luck to them. It is hard to retain talent in Canada.
Canada is very politically correct and so it is not very appropriate to make too many dark accusations. A rough Chi^2 test shows that the sample size is too small for the lack of females or REMs to raise alarms that they are being selected against.
However, the winners should very carefully read their contracts and get canadian legal advice. I understand that money in Canadian universities can disappear suddenly without warning. The rug could be pulled from under them rather unexpectedly. They could get quite a shock. Buying and then having to resell a house in Canada when you are not a citizen can cost a fortune in taxes. Furthermore, look at Vancouver & Toronto housing prices.
4. blue_state_academic - May 19, 2010 at 03:52 pm
I was offered a similar chair in recent years, and the cost of living in a Canadian city (along with the political correctness) was a major disincentive of accepting.