Twenty-five international researchers will be joining the University of Calgary this fall as part of the Canada Global Impact+ Research Talent Initiative, an investment of up to $1.7 billion over 12 years from the Government of Canada to attract and support international and expatriate researchers.
The Research Training Awards program, one of four programs in the Impact+ initiative, supports the recruitment of doctoral students and postdoctoral researchers, securing the talent needed to drive innovation and growth in strategic priority areas, including quantum and cybersecurity, defence, climate resilience, clean technology, and biotechnology.
The Wave 1 announcement, made on May 28 at the University of Ottawa, included 15 doctoral students and 10 postdoctoral researchers who will be joining UCalgary. A second announcement of additional doctoral students and postdoctoral researchers is expected later in the summer or early fall, resulting from an intensive internal selection and recruitment process earlier this year.
"We're excited to welcome these 25 scholars to the University of Calgary as part of the Global Impact+ Research Talent Initiative," says Dr. William Ghali, MD'90, vice-president (research). "This investment from the Government of Canada and the Tri-Agencies will help position UCalgary at the forefront of discovery and innovation in strategic areas key to Canada's future."
From recruitment to impact: research takes shape in the North
For Dr. Jocelyn Hayley, PhD, a professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at the Schulich School of Engineering, the addition of a postdoctoral researcher to her Permafrost Engineering Laboratory (PELC) will allow her team to investigate energy-efficient approaches to artificial ground freezing for small modular reactor foundations in Arctic environments.
"As climate change accelerates permafrost thaw across the Arctic, critical infrastructure, including roads, railways, buildings and emerging energy systems, faces increasing risks from ground instability and long-term settlement," explains Hayley.
The project aims to develop new approaches that reduce refrigeration demand while improving long-term foundation stability under changing climate conditions. The research combines laboratory testing, thermal analysis, and advanced thermo-hydro-mechanical modelling to better understand how frozen soils behave under both climate warming and heat generated by infrastructure systems.
The research builds on PELC's broader work in permafrost engineering and northern infrastructure resilience, including projects focused on Arctic transportation systems, climate adaptation, thermal modelling, and infrastructure monitoring.
"I'm thrilled to welcome a postdoctoral scholar to the Permafrost Engineering Laboratory at UCalgary. His expertise in thermal modelling brings an exciting new perspective to our work in permafrost and climate-resilient infrastructure research," says Hayley.
"That mix of perspectives is where some of the best ideas and innovations happen."
Canada Global Impact+ Research Talent Initiative Phase 1 Research Training Awards
Doctoral awards
Nominator: Dr. Na Li, PhD, Cumming School of Medicine
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Assessing the Health System Impact of AI/Machine Learning-Enhanced Case-Finding in Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease
Nominator: Dr. Amity Quinn, PhD, Cumming School of Medicine
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Evaluating Financing Solutions for Equitable Cervical Cancer Prevention
Nominator: Dr. Yuan Xu, MD, PhD, Cumming School of Medicine
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Developing and Validating Methods to Identify Cancer Outcomes in Real-World Data
Nominator: Dr. Tanvir Chowdhury, PhD, Cumming School of Medicine
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Leveraging Patient Voice and Empowerment to Improve NCD Care in Low-Resource Settings
Nominator: Dr. Derya Sargin, PhD, Faculty of Arts
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Sex-Dependent Neural Circuits Regulating Social Behaviour
Nominator: Dr. Deborah Kurrasch, PhD, Cumming School of Medicine
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Characterizing ventricular cells in healthy brain aging
Nominator: Dr. Signe Bray, PhD, Cumming School of Medicine
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Precision neuroimaging of peri-adolescent brain development and the emergence of anxiety and depression
Nominator: Dr. Nicole Letourneau, PhD, Faculty of Nursing
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: Impact of ATTACH : Impacts on School-age Children's Mental Health
Nominator: Dr. Fadhel Ghannouchi, PhD, Schulich School of Engineering
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: AI-assisted Photonic MIMO Radar
Nominator: Dr. John Soghigian, PhD, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: AI-enabled Surveillance of Mosquitoes and Disease
Nominator: Dr. Christopher Clarkson, PhD, Faculty of Science
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: ML-Accelerated Optimization of CO2-Enhanced Oil Recovery to CO2 Storage Transition under Geological and Operational
Uncertainty
Nominator: Dr. Ahmed Alade Tiamiyu, PhD, Schulich School of Engineering
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Additive Manufacturing of Multifunctional Lattice Structures for Lightweighting
Nominator: Dr. Jed Kaplan, PhD, Faculty of Science
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Drivers and effects of wildfire in Canada's rapidly changing north
Nominator: Dr. Tricia Stadnyk, PhD, Schulich School of Engineering
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Developing a Hybrid Machine Learning-Hydrological Modeling Framework with Enhanced Performance During Low-Flow Periods
Nominator: Dr. Tonya Callaghan, PhD, Werklund School of Education
Funding agency: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
Research project: From Liberation to Regulation: How LGBTQ+ Movements Reframe Youth Identity in the Post-Equality Era in Taiwan
Postdoctoral Awards
Nominator: Dr. James White, MD, Cumming School of Medicine
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Research project: AI-Enabled 4-dimensional Digital Twins for the Prediction of Outcomes in Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy
Nominator: Dr. Jennifer Zwicker, PhD, Faculty of Kinesiology
Funding agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Researc
Research project: Untangling Policy Complexity: A Systems Framework to Improve Child Health and Well-Being
Nominator: Dr. Jocelyn Hayley, PhD, Schulich School of Engineering
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Energy-Efficient Artificial Ground Freezing for Small Modular Reactor Foundations in Arctic Permafrost
Nominator: Dr. Paul Galpern, PhD, Faculty of Science
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Global Promise of Agrivoltaics: Assessing Climate-Resilient Multi-use Land Strategies for Food, Energy, and Land Sustainability
Nominator: Dr. Roberto Souza, PhD, Schulich School of Engineering
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Harmonization of Clinical Information for Multimodal Models of Stroke Outcome Prediction
Nominator: Dr. Kunal Karan, PhD, Schulich School of Engineering
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Turning "cold" breast tumors into immune-responsive "hot" tumors using nanomaterial innovation
Nominator: Dr. Brian Moorman, PhD, Faculty of Arts
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Linking permafrost degradation to landscape stability and water quality in northern communities
Nominator: Dr. Daniel Shugar, PhD, Faculty of Science
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Quantifying the hazard and risk of a potentially giant landslide-triggered tsunami and glacial lake outburst flood in southwest Yukon
Nominator: Dr. Luis D. Virla Alvarado, PhD, Schulich School of Engineering
Funding agency: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
Research project: Renewable-powered, waste-driven Water-Energy-Food (WEF) model [FEWGen]
Nominator: Dr. Sheri Madigan, PhD, Faculty of Arts
Funding agency: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
Research project: Wired and Tired: Sleep, Screen Use, and Mental Health in the All our Families Cohort
