Six Queen’s University researchers have earned funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) John R. Evans Leaders Fund to enhance the infrastructure in their labs. The funding will allow for advanced research into cardiovascular disease, plant health, assistive technology, dark matter, neurological diseases and the oil and gas industry.

“Funding from the John R. Evans Leaders Fund is critical for keeping Queen’s on the leading edge of research,” says Dr. John Fisher, Interim Vice-Principal (Research). “New funding for infrastructure will enhance the capabilities of our laboratories and encourage new and advanced research programs at Queen’s. The Leader’s fund provides the means for our faculty to affect the quality of our lives and to better understand the world we live in.”

Alexander Braun, $180,000 (Geological Sciences, Geological Engineering) - Dr. Braun will using the funding to acquire a superconducting gravimeter, a device that will be used for monitoring fluid migration processes in oil, gas and water reservoirs. There are only 15 of these instruments deployed worldwide and, by adding a second one in Canada, it increases the potential to monitor mass change in reservoirs to improve production efficiency as well as mitigating environmental hazards.

Claire Davies, $125,000 (Mechanical and Materials Engineering) - Dr. Davies will use the funding to support her BDAT (Building and Designing Assistive Technology) Laboratory. Her focus is including the end-user as part of the multi-disciplinary team in the design of assistive technology that best meets their needs.

Jason Gallivan, $150,000 (Psychology) - Dr. Gallivan is working to better understand the perceptual, cognitive and motor-related brain mechanisms in humans, specifically after a stroke. The funding will allow the Memory, Action and Perception laboratory (MAPlab) to acquire new infrastructure that will position Queen’s as a leader in human neuroscience research.

Amer Johri, $120,000 (Medicine) - Dr. Johri, with his collaborator Parvin Mousavi, will develop an advanced imaging tool to detect dangerous types of vessel blockages causing heart disease and stroke. The equipment bolsters establishment of a new Cardiovascular Imaging and Informatics Network at Queen's (CiNQ) dedicated to developing highly skilled trainees with both clinical and computational expertise to address the demand in the changing digital healthcare economy.

Ryan Martin, $250,000 (Physics, Engineering Physics and Astronomy) - The funding will assist Dr. Martin in establishing a world-class facility to develop p-type point contact detectors – a promising technology to understand neutrinos and dark matter better. The technology could lead to a better understanding of dark matter, a yet to be detected form of matter that is five times more abundant in the universe than common matter.

Jacqueline Monaghan, $125,641 (Biology) - The funding will allow for the purchase of new equipment that Dr. Monaghan will use to research plants. Her work focuses on how plant immune proteins work, how they are activated and repressed and how they influence growth and development. This research will lead to more effective measures to fight plant diseases.

For more information visit the CFI website.