When The Honourable Gary Goodyear, Minister of State (Science and Technology), announced the first wave of grants under the Canadian government’s new Collaborative Research and Training Experience (CREATE) Program, two of the 20 successful projects were based at The University of Western Ontario.
The 20 projects share $32 million over the next six years.
Mel Goodale, Canada Research Chair in Visual Neuroscience and a key investigator with the world-renowned Centre for Brain and Mind (an interdisciplinary collaboration between Robarts Research Institute and Western), was awarded $1.65 million in support of his Computational Approaches to Sensorimotor Tranformations for the Control of Action project.
Fellow researcher Rajnikant Patel, a Distinguished University Professor in Western’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, with a cross appointment in the Department of Surgery, and Director of Engineering at Canadian Surgical Technologies & Advanced Robotics (CSTAR), received an identical grant for his Computer-Assisted Medical Intervention (CAMI) program.
Launched by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) in May 2008, CREATE gives science and engineering graduates the enhanced skills set they need for careers in industry, government or academia. Important areas of training include commercialization, communication and project management. Students may also be exposed to other research groups, either nationally or internationally, establishing links that will further their chosen careers.
“We see this as an opportunity to train the next generation of neuroscientists in computational modeling of how the brain selects and controls skilled movements,” says Goodale. “What we want to do is bring together young people from different backgrounds ranging from neurophysiology to mathematics and put them in a milieu where they can become familiar with each other’s research culture.”
Goodale adds not only will the students learn how to construct mathematical models of how information from our senses is used to plan and control motor behaviour, but they will also learn how to design and carry out experiments to test these models using brain imaging and other state-of-the-art techniques.
“The training program will involve researchers from York and Queen’s as well as Western,” he says. “Over the long term, we plan to establish graduate programs in computational neuroscience at all three institutions so that trainees can move easily from one laboratory to another – and profit from joint supervision by researchers with different but complementary skill sets and expertise. “
Patel is also convinced the CREATE funding will allow even better training opportunities.
“There is no program like this anywhere else in Canada,” says Patel. “What we are aiming to do is train graduate students and post-docs for the next generation of engineers and scientists who have the interdisciplinary expertise needed to contribute to Canadian industry in the rapidly advancing field of medical devices and technologies.”