by Barbara Black

The Canada Foundation for Innovation announced in July $925,252 in funding for research infrastructure. The money, part of the CFI’s New Opportunities program, will go to five assistant professors recently arrived at Concordia.

Three of the researchers are in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering. Brandon Gordon is working on a distributed computing environment for real-time simulation of mechanical systems- aerospace and automotive applications. Ibrahim Hassan is studying novel cooling schemes for the next generation of aircraft engines and developing micro-scale power devices. Paula Wood-Adams works on the physics of advanced materials, featured in CTR last year.

Science grants

The Department of Exercise Science’s Robert Boushel and Gerald Zavorsky are working on the regulation of blood flow and oxygen transport during exercise, and vascular remodeling with training. (See story)

Paul Hastings, a psychologist associated with the Centre for Research in Human Development, has a CFI grant to study the physiology and cognition of affective development, and do integrated studies of adaptive emotional processes in children.

Aerospace grants to engineers

Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department has also been awarded five projects from the Consortium for Research and Innovation in Aerospace in Quebec (CRIAQ), a newly established government-sponsored research organization. The total funding for the five projects is $1,938,250.

V.S. Hoa was awarded $141,667 for a research project on the design and manufacture of low-cost composites, in collaboration with Bombardier and Bell Helicopter, for three years.

Jaroslav Svoboda, an expert in the integration of real-time flight simulation and computational fluid dynamics, was awarded $125,000 for three years, plus $37,500 in the fourth year, for a project in collaboration with CAE, and $58,333 per year for three years for a project in collaboration with CMC.

Ion Stiharu was awarded $212,500 per year for three years, plus $63,750 in the fourth year, for a project on the development and integration of microsystems (MEMS) for jet engine control and monitoring, in collaboration with Pratt & Whitney and CMC.

Arts and Science research chairs

Psychologist Andreas Arvanitogiannis, who is a member of the Centre for Studies in Behavioural Neurobiology, was named a Canada Research Chair, the first Concordia professor to be so honoured.

In addition, the Faculty has appointed three of its members to Concordia University Research Chairs: Frederick Bird, who is directing a major study in business ethics around the world; Ann English, whose studies in inorganic chemistry on oxidative stress in cells may yield clues to the aging process in humans; and Gilles Peslherbe, the founding director of Concordia’s Centre for Research in Molecular Modelling.

Junior Researcher Award in JMSB
The John Molson School of Business has established a Distinguished Junior Faculty Research Award, to be presented annually at spring convocation.

The award carries a one-year research grant. Candidates must be full-time tenure-track assistant or associate professors within five years of obtaining their PhDs.