The oil-rich Canadian province of Alberta is hoping some serious money will lure top medical researchers from around the world to move to the province through its new Polaris Awards program, officials announced today. Each award will be worth 20 million Canadian dollars, or $17-million, with the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research putting up half the money. Matching funds will come from a university in the province when it signs up a research star. The first batch of recipients will be announced next year.

The Alberta government, with revenues from the energy sector filling its treasury, put half a billion Canadian dollars into the foundation in 2005. The Polaris, the richest award of its kind in Canada, comes at a time when grant-making agencies and universities are increasingly worried about money, The Globe and Mail reported.

Alan Bernstein, head of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, decried an unprecedented “funding crunch” in an open letter to researchers. On Monday the country’s universities and colleges urged the federal government to “expand and enhance” Canadian research.