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UBC People


UBC People

Former chair of the Board of Governors and five UBC professors receive Order of British Columbia

Six members of the UBC community including the former chair of the Board of Governors, Brad Bennett, and five professors, will be awarded the Order of British Columbia.  They are among 15 British Columbians who will receive the Order of British Columbia in 2010 for their contributions to the province and their extraordinary accomplishments.  The investiture ceremony will be held for recipients on Oct. 21, 2010, in Victoria.

UBC’s six recipients include:

  • Brad Bennett, former chair of UBC’s Board of Governors
  • Dr. Julio Montaner, chair in AIDS Research and head of the Division of AIDS in the Faculty of Medicine at UBC
  • Marco Marra, professor of medical genetics in the Faculty of Medicine at UBC
  • Dr. Robert Brunham, director of UBC’s Centre for Disease Control
  • Bob Hindmarch, professor emeritus in human kinetics and former athletics director
  • The Honourable Jacob “Jack” Austin, honorary professor at the Institute of Asian Research at UBC

 For more information, visit http://www.publicaffairs.ubc.ca/2010/08/10/former-chair-of-the-board-of-governors-and-five-ubc-professors-receive-order-of-british-columbia/

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Peter Wall Institute announces award winners

The Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies (PWIAS) has announced its 2011-2012 Distinguished Scholars in Residence award winners. The program brings up to six outstanding senior UBC scholars together to take up research at the Institute for one year.   Recipients will present a talk on their research, participate in a two-day research retreat, and meet together on a weekly basis. The value of the award is $15,000 plus an additional $5,000 may be provided to support complementary research events.

  • Prof. Maxwell Cameron, Dept. Political Science
  • Prof. Guy Dumont, Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering
  • Prof. Rena Sharon, School of Music
  • Assoc. Prof. Fabio Rossi, Dept. of Medical Genetics
  • Prof. John Steeves, International Collaboration On Repair Discoveries (ICORD), Dept. of Zoology, John and Penny Ryan BC Leadership Chair
  • Prof. Richard Unger, Dept. History

PWIAS has also announced its 2010-2011 Early Career Scholar award winners. The program brings together outstanding tenure-track faculty from diverse disciplines in the early stages of their careers at UBC for one year. The winners participate in a two-day research retreat, and meet together on a monthly basis.  The value of the award is $10,000.

  •  Assoc. Prof. Purang Abolmaesumi, Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering
  • Asst. Prof. Matthew Bedke, Dept. of Philosophy
  • Asst. Prof. Joël Castonguay-Bélanger, Dept. of French, Hispanic and Italian Studies
  • Asst. Prof. Emma Cunliffe, Faculty of Law
  • Assoc. Prof. Jessica De Villiers, Dept. of English
  • Asst. Prof. Simon Donner, Dept. of Geography
  • Asst. Prof. Bo Earle, Dept. of English
  • Asst. Prof. Michael Law, Centre for Health Services and Public Policy and School of Population and Public Health
  • Assoc. Prof. Joanna McGrenere, Dept. of Computer Science
  • Assoc. Prof. Ludovic Van Waerbeke, Dept. of Physics and  Astronomy

The winners for the PWIAS Exploratory Workshops Grant program were announced as well.  The program offers competitive funding for meetings of researchers from various disciplines at UBC with distinguished external experts.  Outcomes may include a special issue of a journal, an edited volume, or an application for a large grant such as a Wall Institute Major Thematic Grant.

  • “Nanospace Biophysics”, Oct. 2 – 4, 2010; Principal Investigator: Assoc. Prof. Edwin Moore, Dept. of Cellular and Physiological Sciences
  • “In from the Margins: New Foundations for Personhood and Legal Capacity in the 21st Century”, April 29 – May 1, 2011, Principal Investigator: Prof. Timothy Stainton, Centre for Inclusion and Citizenship, School of Social Work

 For more information, visit http://www.pwias.ubc.ca/

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Materials engineering graduate student receives research fellowship

Lu Yao, a graduate student in materials engineering, is the recipient of a 2010-11 Rio Tinto Alcan Research Fellowship. Yao came to UBC in September 2007 as a PhD candidate. The title of her PhD project is “Modeling of Microporosity Formation in A356 Aluminum Alloy Castings”.  Its main objective is to study the effect of various casting conditions, including cooling rate, hydrogen level and metal cleanliness on microporosity formation.

The Fellowships are for students pursuing graduate and post-graduate degrees in science or engineering and are awarded to one student at each of eight participating Canadian universities each year.

For more information, visit http://blogs.apsc.ubc.ca/mtrlnews/2010/08/11/lu-yao-recipient-of-rio-tinto-alcan-research-fellowship/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ubc-mtrl-news+%28UBC+Materials+Engineering+News%29

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National undergraduate research poster competition to be held at UBC

From Aug. 18 – 21, UBC will host the third Rising Stars of Research (RSR) Conference, a cross-disciplinary undergraduate research event that will give 117 Canadian and three Hong Kong students the opportunity to showcase their research accomplishments and develop a network of friends and colleagues.

The centrepiece of RSR is a poster competition held on Aug. 19 from 11 a.m. – 3 p.m. in the Life Sciences Centre (public welcome).   The conference will also include workshops, talks from faculty researchers, and facility tours.  For more information, visit http://www.risingstars.ubc.ca/

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