The University of Winnipeg has received two new prestigious Canada Research Chairs (CRC). Dr. Mirjana Roksandic and Dr. Sanoji Wijenayake have collectively received $1.8 million in Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) funding as Canada Research Chairs. CRCs are world-class scientists and scholars from diverse backgrounds who are working on new discoveries across disciplines.
Dr. Mirjana Roksandic (L) and Dr. Sanoji Wijenayake (R).
"The appointment of two new Canada Research Chairs highlights the outstanding research excellence at UWinnipeg," said Dr. Jitendra Paliwal, UWinnipeg Vice-President, Research and Innovation. "Dr. Roksandic and Dr. Wijenayake are engaged in research that advances our understanding of human evolutionary history and explores innovative approaches to addressing childhood obesity and metabolic disease."
The appointment of two new Canada Research Chairs highlights the outstanding research excellence at UWinnipeg.
Dr. Jitendra Paliwal
Prof. Roksandic is a Tier 1 NSERC Canada Research Chair in Human Evolution. She was granted $1.4 million allocated over a seven-year period, with the possibility of renewal for an additional seven years under the same research funding terms.
Recent advances in human evolution research, including ancient DNA analysis, proteomics, and micro-CT scanning, have transformed our understanding of where humans came from and how early human species evolved and migrated. Expanding discoveries across new geographic regions made the story of human evolution increasingly complex and nuanced.
"It is exciting to see growing interest in human evolutionary origins. By extending our program of research into the Eastern Mediterranean and East Africa and looking deeper into the evolutionary history of apes, this program is seeking a longer and wider viewpoint that will result in new perspectives the perennial question where do we come from, how did we get here, and where are we headed' that is relevant to all of us," shared Prof Roksandic.
Prof. Roksandic's CRC will focus on the Eastern Mediterranean and Balkan Peninsula, a region recognized as critical to understanding primate and human evolution but still not significantly researched. Through interdisciplinary and international collaboration, the program aims to uncover new ape and human fossil evidence and examine how early hominin groups migrated, interacted, and adapted to changing environments.
The research will explore key questions surrounding the origins of bipedalism, the earliest migrations of the genus Homo into Europe, and the relationships between African and Eurasian hominin populations. By examining human evolution from a broader geographic perspective, the program seeks to provide new insight into the origins of our species and reshape current understanding of human evolutionary history.
Dr. Mirjana Roksandic is currently Professor in the Department of Anthropology, and graduate faculty at the University of Manitoba.
Dr. Sanoji Wijenayake is a Tier 2 NSERC Canada Research Chair in Milk Nanovesicles and Applied Health. She was granted a total amount of $600,000 over five years, with the potential for renewal for an additional five-year term.
One in three Canadian women enter pregnancy with overweight or obesity, increasing the likelihood that their children will also develop obesity and related metabolic conditions. Exclusive breast/chest milk feeding during the first six months of life has been shown to significantly reduce these risks in children. However, the biologically active molecules in milk that provide these benefits need to be identified and characterized.
Dr. Wijenayake investigates the role of one of these biologically active milk compounds, called milk-derived extracellular vesicles (MEVs).
"Think of MEVs as biological couriers. Just as Amazon or FedEx delivers your packages to the doorstep, MEVs deliver important biological material, including DNA, RNA, fats, and proteins from mother to child during critical periods of lactation," explained Dr. Wijenayake. "These tiny fat bubbles in milk influence development, metabolism, inflammatory responses and long-term health outcomes in children."
This CRC will allow Dr. Wijenayake to study MEVs as a therapeutic that can fight childhood illnesses.
"In the next five years, we are going to embark on mechanistic directives to understand how MEVs are produced, how they get into different cells and what they do once they get to where they are going. Then we will bioengineer MEVs and identify homing mechanisms, gene hubs and protein networks that are being tinkered by MEVs in biological systems," Dr. Wijenayake said.
Dr. Wijenayake is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biology, the co-director of the Center for Cell and Systems Biology, and is the Principal Investigator of the Wijenayake Research Group.
Dr. Mirjana Roksandic and Dr. Sanoji Wijenayake join the list of UWinnipeg's Canada Research Chairs. "The University of Winnipeg is proud of the significant scholarly contributions made by our faculty and looks forward to the insights and advancements these appointments will foster," said Dr. Paliwal.
The Canada Research Chairs (CRC) Program is a tri-agency initiative of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) aimed at enhancing research excellence in Canada in the humanities, social sciences, health sciences, natural sciences, and engineering.
