Introduction – Dr. Steven Franklin, Vice-President Research
NSERC 25th Anniversary Public Lecture
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Funding from NSERC -- the federal Natural Sciences and Engineering Research
Council -- has fostered vitally important research and innovation at the U of S
over the past 25 years.
First let me say how grateful we are for NSERC’s tremendous support and for the
associated funding from our provincial and corporate partners, some of whom are
represented here today.
I’d also like to emphasize how extremely proud we are of the accomplishments of
all our NSERC-funded faculty and students. These NSERC-assisted research
successes will help us achieve our goal of becoming one of the top 10
medical/doctoral universities in Canada, and one of a select few internationally in
key areas.
Today we will recognize the 38 U of S researchers who have held continuous
NSERC funding over the past 25 years. This represents almost 1,000 years of
collective research experience funded by NSERC, work that has resulted in more
than 4,000 peer-reviewed papers and more than 40 books.
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This is indeed an august group of researchers. Seven have been recognized as U
of S Distinguished Researchers. Several are Fellows of the Royal Society of
Canada, and at least one has been awarded the Order of Canada, our country’s
highest civilian honor.
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With the help of $10.4 million from NSERC over the past 25 years, these
researchers have found new insights and solutions to many agricultural,
environmental, and industrial challenges. Let me mention just a few:
o U of S expertise in the reliability and performance of electrical generating
systems played a key role nationally in the aftermath of the devastating ice
storms of a few years ago.
o Our civil engineering research has dramatically reduced deaths from land
slides in the Hong Kong region. Our software tools for analyzing soil
characteristics for major civil engineering projects such as highways and
mines are now sold in more than 80 countries worldwide.
o In biology, our research has advanced the world's knowledge of how plant
cells divide and has led to advanced tools and techniques in cell culture,
cloning and plant physiology that benefit both agriculture and forestry.
o In physics, our research has to the design of instruments to study the
Earth’s atmosphere from orbit, shedding light on important questions like
the health of the world’s protective ozone layer. NSERC-funded research
has also led to breakthroughs in the design and construction of Tokamak
reactors used to harness fusion as an energy source.
o In agriculture, our 25-grant holders researchers have developed tools to
improve animal nutrition that cut costs and increase profits for Canadian
farmers. They’ve developed world-leading conservation tillage methods
that save irreplaceable soils and decrease carbon emissions from farming.
And they’ve harnessed soil microbes as environmentally friendly
pesticides, offering Canadian farmers new tools to protect their crops.
o In mathematics, we’ve developed advanced mathematical tools for a wide
range of applications, from testing the speed of computers to intelligent
robotic systems.
o In the earth sciences, they’ve developed theories and advanced seismic
tools that have shed light on the structure and formation of the Earth’s
crust, providing powerful new prospecting tools for the Canadian mining
industry.
o Our scientists have also examined how toxic metals like cadmium,
mercury and arsenic are bound in soils, enabling us to better understand
how to protect the environment, especially our water supplies.
o Their work has led to a total of 27 patents and 11 spin-off companies. One
examples is world-renowned expertise in heat and moisture exchange
systems for energy-efficient buildings that has been the foundation for
several Saskatchewan companies with millions of dollars in annual sales.
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NSERC funding has also provided exciting opportunities for our undergraduate
and graduate students to become active in research in the sciences and
engineering. Through the work of our 38 long-time grant holders, more than 860
of our graduate students and 140 of our post-doc students have been funded over
the past 25 years.
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We look forward through our partnership with NSERC to more opportunities to
develop nationally and internationally recognized expertise, increase the supply of
highly qualified people in the sciences and engineering, and triple key
commercialization performance outcomes.
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The Office of the Vice-President Research is committed to assisting our
researchers to take greater advantage of NSERC’s funding opportunities.