Dr. Lisa Lix, professor of community health sciences and a UM Canada Research Chair in electronic health data quality, and Dr. Ryan Zarychanski, professor of internal medicine and the Lyonel G. Israels Research Chair in Hematology, are among the 49 new CAHS fellows for 2024.  

“Congratulations to Drs. Lix and Zarychanski,” said Dr. Peter Nickerson, UM vice-provost (health sciences) and dean of the Max Rady College of Medicine. “As a CAHS fellow myself, I welcome your expertise and enthusiasm to this Canada-wide group of accomplished scientists and scholars working to advance the health of Canadians and people around the world.”  

Dr. Trevor Young, president of the CAHS, said that election to the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences acknowledges outstanding contributions to the health sciences.  

“We are proud of these Fellows’ accomplishments, and we are honoured to welcome them to the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences,” Young said. 

Lix is an international leader in statistical and data science methods for population-based electronic health data. She is working on improving chronic disease prediction models and collaborates with such organizations as the Public Health Agency of Canada on chronic disease surveillance methods.  

She is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Canadian Society of Epidemiology and Biostatics and is a fellow of the American Statistical Association. Lix provides national leadership to train the next generation of scientists on artificial intelligence in public health.  

Lix said she is thrilled to be inducted into the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.  

“While it is an honour to be recognized for my leadership and accomplishments in the health sciences, I also recognize that there is a responsibility for ongoing and continued commitment to the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences to contribute my expertise on health-related topics that are of importance to all Canadians,” Lix said.  

Zarychanski’s research focuses on the hematologic aspects of critical illness and he leads several national and international randomized trials in the fields of sepsis, anticoagulation and blood conservation.  

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Zarychanski and team developed novel clinical trial methods to speed knowledge generation and facilitate global collaboration. These adaptive platform trials identified several effective therapies for hospitalized patients to improve survival and prevent illness progression that have been widely adopted in Canada and around the world.  

Zarychanski, who is also a researcher with CancerCare Manitoba, said it is a tremendous honour to be inducted into the CAHS and it speaks to the supportive scientific environment at UM and CancerCare Manitoba that helps support world-class science and made-in-Manitoba discoveries.  

“While the goal of the research and clinical trials our local team undertakes squarely focuses on improving patient outcomes and the function and sustainability of our health system, external validation of the team’s commitment and impact is energizing,” Zarychanski said. “With the decorated fellows in the academy, I look forward to promoting clinical trials in health research as one core component of a learning health system.” 

View the list of UM CAHS fellows.  

CRCs are world leaders in their field funded by the Government of Canada in the areas of natural sciences and engineering, health sciences, and social sciences and humanities. “These symposia were a wonderful opportunity for researchers to get to know each other’s specialties, and to spark new collaborations with students and the wider community,” says Mario Pinto, Vice-President (Research and International). “I thank all the CRCs for their groundbreaking contributions to address the issues faced by society today.”

This thought-provoking look at current UM research is available to view online, each featuring a brief presentation from the gathered CRCs followed by a question-and-answer period with the audience.

CRC Symposium 1, February 2, 2023 – Fort Garry Campus

Featuring presentations from: Heather Armstrong, Chair in Integrative Bioscience; Guozhen Zhu, Chair in Mechanical and Functional Design of Nanostructured Materials; Trust Beta, Chair in Grain-Based Functional Foods; Eric Collins, Chair in Arctic Marine Microbial Ecosystem Services; Britt Drögemöller, Chair in Pharmacogenomics & Precision Medicine; Ned Budisa, Chair in Chemical Synthetic Biology and Xenobiology; Lori Wilkinson, Chair in Migration Futures; Jason Kindrachuk, Chair in Epidemiology and Global Public Health; Sabine Mai, Chair in Genomic Instability and Nuclear Architecture in Cancer; Jörg Stetefeld, Chair in Structural Biology and Biophysics; Carl Ho, Chair in Efficient Utilization of Electric Power; and Nandika Bandara, Chair in Food Proteins.

CRC Symposium 2, February 27, 2023 – Bannatyne Campus

Featuring presentations from: Tracie Afifi, Chair in Childhood Adversity and Resilience; Robert Lorway, Chair in Global Intervention Politics and Social Transformation; Janilyn Arsenio, Chair in Systems Biology of Chronic Inflammation; Puyan Mojabi, Chair in Electromagnetic Inversion for Characterization and Design; Annette Desmarais, Chair in Human Rights, Social Justice and Food Sovereignty; Zulma Rueda, Chair in Program Sciences & Global Public Health; and Kathryn Sibley, Chair in Integrated Knowledge Translation in Rehabilitation Sciences.

CRC Symposium 3, March 28, 2023 – Fort Garry Campus

Featuring presentations from: Ties Boerma, Chair in Population and Global Health; Kiera Ladner, Chair in Miyo we’citowin, Indigenous Governance & Digital Sovereignties; Rotimi Aluko, Chair in Bioactive Peptides; Zahra Moussavi, Chair in Biomedical Engineering; Terry Klassen, Chair in Clinical Trials; and Galen Wright, Chair in Neurogenomics.

CRC Symposium 4, April 24, 2023 – Bannatyne Campus

Featuring presentations from: Lisa Lix, Chair in Methods for Electronic Health Data Quality; John Ataguba, Chair in Health Economics; Nicole Wilson, Chair in Arctic Environmental Change and Governance; Lorrie Kirshenbaum, Chair in Molecular Cardiology; Meghan Azad, Chair in Developmental Origins of Chronic Disease; and Kristine Cowley, Chair in Function and Health after Spinal Cord Injury.

CRC Symposium 5, May 16, 2023 – Fort Garry Campus

Featuring presentations from: Kristina Brown, Chair in Arctic Marine Biogeochemistry; Nicole Rosen, Chair in Language Interactions; Robert Mizzi, Chair in Queer, Community & Diversity Education; Samar Safi-Harb, Chair in Extreme Astrophysics; and Susan Logue, Chair in Cell Stress and Inflammation.

CRC Symposium 6, June 19, 2023 – Bannatyne Campus

Featuring presentations from: Andrew Halayko, Chair in Chronic Lung Disease Pathobiology and Treatment; Colin Gilmore, Chair in Applied Electromagnetic Inversion; James Blanchard, Chair in Epidemiology and Global Public Health; Marcelo Urquia, Chair in Applied Population Health; and Souradet Shaw, Chair in Program Science & Global Public Health.

The recently announced grants from the Fall 2022 funding round went to faculty members in medicine, nursing and pharmacy.

“This outstanding result reflects the high calibre of our health researchers,” said UM Vice-President (Research and International) Dr. Mario Pinto.

“This funding will enable UM laboratory scientists to advance knowledge in areas such as cardiovascular health, spinal cord injury, rheumatoid arthritis, asthma, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and Rett syndrome. Rady Faculty investigators will also conduct cutting-edge data research, as well as vital studies aimed at supporting mental health and well-being.”

The largest grant of more than $1.4 million went to a team led by Dr. Linda Larcombe, an associate professor of internal medicine, community health sciences and medical microbiology/infectious diseases.

Larcombe is an anthropologist whose research focuses on First Nations history, health and collaborative research. Her grant will fund a three-year project called “Connecting with cultural heritage: Land-based learning and healing through archeology in northern Manitoba.”

The study team will create and evaluate a land-based healing and cultural heritage program that will enable youth to explore archeological sites and artifacts reflecting the thousands of years of Inuit, Dene and Cree presence along the coast of Hudson Bay at Churchill, Man.

“We will determine if cultural heritage in land-based healing programming can contribute to wellness and leadership development of Inuit, Dene and Cree youth,” the researchers wrote.

Here’s a look at the other funded projects. More information on the studies and research teams is available here.

Dr. Harvey Max Chochinov, distinguished professor, psychiatry, Max Rady College of Medicine

Grant: $100,000 (one year)

In Chochinov’s study, health-care professionals will hold conversations with cancer patients, guided by the Patient Dignity Question: “What do I need to know about you as a person to take the best care of you possible?” The study will measure how this affects the experiences of both patients and care providers.

Dr. Ian Dixon, professor, physiology and pathophysiology, Max Rady College of Medicine; principal investigator, Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences, St. Boniface Hospital

Grant: $1,040,400 (five years)

Dixon’s project centres on proteins and processes involved in skin wound healing, with the goal of developing treatments to speed wound closure and reduce scarring. The study will investigate how age and sex affect dermal healing. It will also examine the healing of skin damage caused by chemotherapy and radiation.

Dr. Soheila Karimi, professor, physiology and pathophysiology, Max Rady College of Medicine; researcher, Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba (CHRIM)

Grant: $1,136,025 (five years)

Neural stem cell therapy has exciting potential for patients with spinal cord injury, but it currently faces the challenge that the cells die after they are transplanted. Karimi’s project will test an experimental treatment aimed at optimizing the use of neural stem cells for repairing spinal cord injury.

Dr. Jason Kindrachuk, assistant professor, medical microbiology and infectious diseases, Max Rady College of Medicine; Canada Research Chair in molecular pathogenesis of emerging viruses; researcher, CHRIM

Grant: $750,000 (five years)

Kindrachuk’s team will investigate the circulation and transmission of the monkeypox virus in wildlife in regions of Africa where the virus is endemic, as well as surrounding areas. They will also assess the potential impact of the virus on Canadian wildlife.

Dr. Lorrie Kirshenbaum, professor, physiology and pathophysiology, Max Rady College of Medicine; Canada Research Chair in molecular cardiology; director, Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences, St. Boniface Hospital Albrechtsen Research Centre

Grant: $853,931 (five years)

Kirshenbaum’s project builds on the growing evidence of a link between body-clock disruptions – like those experienced by shift workers and people with health issues such as sleep apnea – and cardiac dysfunction. He will investigate the relationship between circadian disruption and heart attack.

Dr. Lisa Lix, professor, community health sciences, Max Rady College of Medicine; Canada Research Chair in methods for electronic health data quality

Grant: $508,725 (three and a half years)

Lix’s study focuses on using anonymized health-care databases to construct personal and family disease histories for chronic illnesses, such as heart disease. Researchers will compare two methods for creating disease histories, using data from Manitoba and Denmark, and assess their value for predicting disease risk.

Dr. Suresh Mishra, professor, internal medicine, Max Rady College of Medicine

Grant: $100,000 (one year)

Mishra will explore the role of cholesterol in the body’s production of steroid hormones. He aims to develop new ways to treat altered steroid hormone levels, which can lead to infertility and illnesses such as inflammatory diseases.

Dr. Neeloffer Mookherjee, professor, internal medicine; researcher, CHRIM

Grant: $100,000 (one year)

Mookherjee’s team will look at differences in how rheumatoid arthritis (RA) develops in males and females. In addition to using a mouse model, her team will study human samples from close relatives of RA patients, who may show changes in their blood before the appearance of clinical RA symptoms.

Dr. Christopher Pascoe, assistant professor, physiology and pathophysiology; researcher, CHRIM

Grant: $100,000 (one year)

Pascoe’s project aims to better understand how diabetes in pregnancy increases the risk of asthma in offspring. He will examine how maternal diabetes increases the twitchiness of airway smooth muscle in the lungs of offspring, and whether a specific enzyme co-ordinates changes in this muscle.

Dr. Mojgan Rastegar, professor, biochemistry and medical genetics, Max Rady College of Medicine; researcher, CHRIM

Grant: $990,675 (five years)

Rastegar has been working for more than 10 years to understand the pathobiology of Rett syndrome, a severe neurodevelopmental disorder in young children. This study will investigate the molecular and cellular abnormalities of the brain in this syndrome. The goal is to pave the way for therapeutic strategies.

Dr. Emily Rimmer, assistant professor, internal medicine, Max Rady College of Medicine

Grant: $307,530 (three years)

Rimmer’s project is a pilot study in preparation for an international randomized controlled trial of therapeutic plasma exchange as a treatment for septic shock. The researchers see potential for this treatment to save lives by removing harmful substances from the blood and replacing missing blood components.

Dr. Zulma Rueda, associate professor, medical microbiology and infectious diseases, Max Rady College of Medicine; Canada Research Chair in sexually transmitted infection – resistance and control

Grant: $100,000 (one year)

Rueda’s team will look at the incidence and impact of methamphetamine use and concurrent sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections in people living with HIV in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. One of the study’s goals is effective knowledge-sharing among people living with HIV, service providers and communities.

Dr. Geoffrey Tranmer, associate professor, College of Pharmacy

Grant: $100,000 (one year)

Tranmer will focus on edaravone, one of the few drugs approved to treat amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. In its current form, this medication has many limitations. Tranmer’s team plans to develop improved versions of edaravone and test them in order to optimize the drug and prepare it for advanced clinical trials.

Dr. Sonia Udod, associate professor, College of Nursing

Grant: $450,000 (three years)

Udod’s research will examine how health system leaders have adapted in response to the pandemic. She aims to determine how leaders can build their own and nurses’ psychological health and well-being to ensure a healthy workforce and organizational resilience at hospitals during and after the COVID-19 crisis.

Dr. Roberta Woodgate, distinguished professor, College of Nursing; Canada Research Chair in child and family engagement in health research and healthcare; researcher, CHRIM

Grant: $776,475 (five years)

Woodgate’s youth-centred, mixed-methods study aims to understand the impacts of COVID-19 on the mental health and well-being of Manitoba youth who have come of age during the pandemic. The findings will inform recommendations to improve services and supports for this population.

Grant: $100,000 (one year)

Woodgate’s team will also conduct a youth-centered, arts-based longitudinal study that will result in the creation and evaluation of a toolkit. This toolkit, co-created by youth, will be designed for use in schools to foster social connectedness and optimize youth mental health and well-being.

One research team aims to better understand the lingering condition known as “long COVID” and the other to examine, at the cellular level, how a receptor for the disease-causing virus works.

Long COVID

The post-COVID-19 syndrome that some patients experience – a condition called long COVID – is poorly defined, said Dr. Alan Katz, director of the Manitoba Centre for Health Policy (MCHP) and professor of community health sciences and family medicine at the Max Rady College of Medicine in the Rady Faculty of Health Sciences.

Dr. Alan Katz

“This condition is really brand new, and clinicians just don’t know enough about it,” said Katz, the project’s nominated principal investigator. “I’m hoping that we can shine a light on these long-term effects of COVID-19 in a way that can help people deal with this in the future.” 

When a person visits their family doctor with long COVID symptoms – such as fatigue, shortness of breath or cough – it’s not easy for the physician to diagnose the syndrome because there is no test to confirm it, Katz said.

The goal of the study, which received $202,000 from the CIHR for one year, is to help clearly define the risk factors, determine who is more likely to get long COVID and describe the long-term effects of the syndrome. The researchers want to define the kinds of symptoms people are reporting, determine how frequent those symptoms are and provide guidance around diagnosing the condition.

To do this, they will study anonymized health data from the Manitoba Population Research Data Repository held at the MCHP. The researchers will zero in on patients with a COVID-19 diagnosis and follow them, analyzing whether there is an increase in visits to their doctors and tracking their symptoms.

The project’s other principal investigators are Dr. Lisa Lix, professor of community health sciences and Canada Research Chair in methods for electronic health data quality, Dr. Yoav Keynan, associate professor of internal medicine, and Dr. Alex Singer, associate professor of family medicine.

Viral signal transmission inside cells

Dr. Ruey-Chyi Su co-leads a team that will investigate how the binding of the spike proteins of various coronavirus variants to the host-cell receptor known as ACE2 affects viral spread and mortality rates. 

Dr. Ruey-Chyi Su

Little is known about what happens inside cells when the spike protein engages the receptor ACE2, said Su, a research scientist at the Public Health Agency of Canada and adjunct professor of medical microbiology and infectious diseases at the Max Rady College of Medicine.

“This is a much-understudied area,” Su said. “It’s very exciting for us because this grant allows us to study whether the engagement of coronavirus variants with ACE2 triggers different sets of events inside the infected cells, leading to increased viral replication and influencing the severity of the disease.”

The study, which received $430,000 from the CIHR for one year, aims to profile molecular changes caused by the viral spike protein binding to the ACE2 receptor and to identify the changes that are unique to the spike protein of each variant. These changes will be examined in cells from both men and women to determine whether sex has any influence.

The researchers also want to know if the cells of healthy people respond differently to the virus binding to the receptor than the cells of people with chronic diseases, such as diabetes.

“I believe what we find will open up a lot of questions, like, ‘Why do our cells respond differently during a viral infection, and what determines that difference?’” Su said. “The project will increase our knowledge of what to expect during a viral infection and also provide knowledge that might lead to treatments. It’s really a knowledge-building study.”

Su’s co-principal investigator is Dr. James Davie, distinguished professor of biochemistry and medical genetics. The co-applicants are Dr. Brad Doble, associate professor and Bihler Chair in Stem Cell Research in pediatrics, biochemistry and the regenerative medicine program, and Dr. Sandra Gonzalez-Diaz, Su’s post-doctoral fellow.

The projects reflect the broad range of investigation being carried out across the Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, said Peter Nickerson [B.Sc.(Med.)/86, MD/86], vice-dean research of the Rady Faculty.

“One of these studies will harness nearly 50 years’ worth of health data, one will take a leading-edge approach to involving young patients and their families in research and knowledge-sharing, and the third will use the latest techniques in epigenomics, transcriptomics and proteomics to decode a rare genetic disorder,” Nickerson said.

The Rady Innovation Fund has allocated a total of $1 million over three years, supporting 10 projects. The fund was made possible by the gift of $30 million by philanthropists Ernest and Evelyn Rady.

The one-year grants have provided seed funding for collaborative projects that bring together researchers from various departments and colleges.

“We’re very grateful for the Rady investment,” Nickerson said. “All 10 of the Rady Innovation grants have fostered multidisciplinary teams to undertake truly novel research projects that can lead to transformative change in health care.”

Here are the three projects selected for funding in 2020:

Mining data to reveal inherited health risks

A cutting-edge “big data” study will link Manitobans’ electronic health records with those of their adult children. The aim is to measure, across a population, how much having a parent with a chronic disease raises a person’s risk for that disease, or related illnesses.

Manitoba is one of the few places in the world where longitudinal health records are complete enough to allow for this kind of family study.         

The researchers will mine anonymized health records stored at the Manitoba Centre for Health Policy (MCHP) for every Manitoba adult who saw a doctor from 1970 to 2018.

They will use machine-learning algorithms to construct lifetime health histories for parents and their grown children, then use these histories to predict the risk of diabetes, heart disease and asthma in offspring.

Lisa Lix [M.Sc./91, PhD/95], professor of community health sciences, Canada Research Chair in methods for electronic health data quality and senior scientist at MCHP, leads the study.

Team members represent the departments of community health sciences, biochemistry/medical genetics and internal medicine, as well as the department of statistics in the Faculty of Science, and the College of Pharmacy.

Developing a living lab for rehabilitation research

Dr. Mandy Archibald, assistant professor of nursing, leads a team that will explore the concept of a “living laboratory” where research on pediatric rehabilitation could be carried out and communicated in innovative ways.

The proposed lab would be located at Specialized Services for Children and Youth, a Winnipeg facility that serves children with disabilities and special needs.

First, the researchers will identify research priorities through interviews and gather survey data from patients, siblings, caregivers and clinicians. Then three prototypes for the lab will be co-designed for public engagement and voting.

The aims of the lab include responding to the lived experience, needs and research priorities of children, families and clinicians; getting research findings into practice quickly; and using engaging techniques, such as arts-based methods, to gather and share knowledge.

Once the lab is established, the researchers believe it will be one of the world’s first clinically embedded living laboratories.

Archibald’s team includes a community member, as well as faculty members from the College of Nursing, College of Rehabilitation Sciences and department of pediatrics and child health.

Uncovering the mechanism of Rett syndrome

A team led by Dr. Mojgan Rastegar, associate professor of biochemistry and medical genetics, will investigate how deficiencies at the cellular level cause impaired brain function in patients with Rett syndrome.

The syndrome, which has no cure, is a severe neurodevelopmental disorder in girls, caused by the mutation of a single gene. Symptoms, which include loss of speech, mental disability and seizures, start to appear when a child is six to 18 months old.

Rastegar, a leading Rett syndrome researcher, has studied mouse models of the disorder and made progress in understanding the role of a protein, MeCP2, in the brains of those affected.

Her lab is unique in Canada in receiving donated post-mortem brain tissue from individuals with Rett syndrome. Rastegar’s study team will use leading-edge techniques to conduct a genome-wide study of DNA, RNA and proteins in this tissue, comparing it with brain samples from controls who did not have the syndrome. The goal is to identify potential target genes for treatment.

Team members are from the departments of pathology and physiology/pathophysiology.

Read more about the funded projects

But a new pan-Canadian project—the SPOR Canadian Data Platform—will free this valuable data to researchers across the country and spur new insights and policies to keep Canadians safe and healthy.

The University of Manitoba’s Dr. Alan Katz will play a key role in this new endeavour, which was announced today by the Honourable Ginette Petitpas Taylor, Minister of Health. With $81 million in support nationally, this initiative will make it easier for researchers to access and share health research data. The project will be led by the University of British Columbia.

Katz, a professor of in the department of community health sciences at the Max Rady College of Medicine, and Director of the Manitoba Centre for Health Policy (MCHP), will co-lead the Manitoba project arm with Dr. Lisa Lix, Canada Research Chair in Methods for Electronic Health Data Quality.

“It is a great honour to lend MCHP’s expertise and the insights we have garnered over the past 30 years of conducting groundbreaking population health studies with the SPOR network,” Katz says. “With our SPOR partners, we are about to revolutionize this field and better position our communities to address the most pressing health challenges of our time.”

The SPOR Data Platform—SPOR is short for Strategy for Patient-Oriented Research—is a single portal through which researchers from coast to coast to coast will be able to analyze data held in another province.

“Manitoba was the first province to recognize the value of analyzing the data collected to manage the health care system,” Katz says. This resulted in the establishment of the Manitoba Centre for Health Policy to provide information on the health of the Manitoba population almost 30 years ago.

“Because of our leadership role in doing population health research in Manitoba, the local team will be leading the most complex task in this multimillion dollar project. We will co-develop the capability for researchers to compare data from multiple jurisdictions,” Katz says.

Previously, on the national scale, sharing data has been a challenge because of issues of provincial or territorial jurisdiction. The new data platform will help foster an environment where researchers can share research evidence and more easily build on the work of their peers, leading to the kinds of advances that improve our health and strengthen our health care system.

“We are fortunate in Canada to be home to many world-class health researchers who play an essential role in helping address some of the most pressing challenges facing our country,” says Petitpas Taylor. “The Government of Canada is proud to collaborate with the governments of British Columbia and Ontario, and other organizations from across the country, to invest in research infrastructure to ensure that our scientists have the tools they need to do their jobs.”

Canada Research Chairs (CRC) improve our depth of knowledge and quality of life, and attract graduate students from around the world to Manitoba, helping drive our economy by fuelling discovery.

Seven of the 10 chairs named at the U of M will be held by women and two of the researchers joined Minister Duncan: Trust Beta, CRC in Grain-Based Functional Foods, and Nancy Kang, who comes to Manitoba from the United States to become a CRC in Transnational Feminisms and Gender-Based Violence.

“The future of research and science in Canada will be led by the next generation of talent,” Minister Duncan said. “That’s why it is so important that we support our early career researchers today. There’s is no better place than Canada to be a scientist. That’s why Canada Research Chairs come here from diverse backgrounds and choose Canada to pursue their ambitious research goals, build their teams and maintain Canada’s position as a global leader in research excellence.”

Digvir S. Jayas, Vice-President (Research and International) and Distinguished Professor at the University of Manitoba, echoed the Minister’s sentiments.

 “I congratulate these 10 researchers on their success in earning these competitive funds,” he said. “They are trailblazers in their fields and will enrich our community with their ideas and discoveries.”

The 10 new and renewed chairs will receive an investment of $9.5 million from the CRC program.

The Nov. 14, 2018 Canada Research Chairs announcement.

The 10 CRCs

Janilyn Arsenio.

Janilyn Arsenio, internal medicine
Chair in Systems Biology of Chronic Inflammation

Heterogeneity in T cell fate and function is required for effective immune responses and the prevention of immune dysregulation. Dysregulation can lead to over-activated immune responses in autoimmune diseases and transplant rejections, or to a loss of immune function, termed exhaustion, in chronic infections and cancer. Arsenio’s research will define the molecular mechanisms underlying T cell differentiation into functional regulators of the immune system. This knowledge is essential for the development of novel therapies to effectively treat infectious and non-infectious (autoimmune and cancer) diseases and to enhance our understanding of immune responses during transplant rejections.

Trust Beta.

Trust Beta, food and human nutritional sciences
Chair in Grain-Based Functional Foods

The health care issues associated with North American diet and lifestyle include obesity, several forms of cancer and cardiovascular diseases. In order to counteract diet-related diseases, research in the area of functional foods is essential to allow development of accessible whole grain foods that will have a positive impact on the health of Canadians. Beta’s research addresses unique and critical questions relating to the extent to which constituents in foods can confer health benefits by scavenging excessive free radicals, inducing antioxidant defenses, reducing lipid oxidation, lowering LDL cholesterol, and inhibiting cancer cell proliferation following consumption of whole grain-based products.

Nediljko Budisa.

Nediljko Budisa, chemistry
Chair in Chemical Synthetic Biology
Coming from Technische Universitat Berlin, Germany

Modern genetic engineers aim at building living systems in order to establish technologies to produce virtually every imaginable medically or industrially interesting substance. The long-term objective of Budisa’s research is to create highly modular bio-inspired materials useful for both academia and (bio)industrial purposes. Budisa will achieve these objectives by 1) developing protein-based natural polymer materials with the potential to revolutionize bone surgery and wound healing; 2) engineering biological alternatives to conductive carbon nanotubes for use in energy storage, water filters, bio-electronic devices and more.

Annette Desmarais.

Annette Desmarais, sociology and criminology
Chair in Human Rights, Social Justice and Food Sovereignty (Renewed)

The goal of this research program is to advance research on the conceptual framework, practice, politics and potential of food sovereignty to build ecologically sustainable, socially-just, and healthy food systems. The objectives of the proposed research are: 1) to investigate the role of land tenure dynamics in enhancing and/or hindering the implementation of food sovereignty in Canada and beyond; 2) to conduct a gender analysis of member organizations of La Vía Campesina and its international strategies and structures; and 3) to analyze the experiences and challenges of youth entering agriculture and engaging in food system transformation.

Colin Gilmore.

Colin Gilmore, electrical and computer engineering
Chair in Applied Electromagnetic Inversion

Gilmore’s research program will advance the art and science of Applied Electromagnetic Inversion (EMI), which uses electromagnetic waves to quantitatively image internal properties of objects and inaccessible regions of interest. The objectives are to: 1) develop new EMI systems to improve imaging sensitivity and resolution; 2) advance the algorithms that create the images from the data; and 3) develop entirely novel systems (hardware and algorithms) for imaging remote targets. This research program will have immediate impact on food security, cancer diagnosis and monitoring, and arctic science and geo-prospecting.

Nancy Kang.

Nancy Kang, women’s and gender studies
Chair in Transnational Feminisms and Gender-Based Violence
Coming from the University of Baltimore, USA

Kang’s research will interrogate how black, Indigenous, and Asian-descended women in Canada and the United States articulate their experiences with gender-based violence in situations of mass oppression, or what may be termed inter-ethnic/inter-racial nodes. Nodes are clusters of historical experiences within which manifestations of violence—especially gender and sexuality-based—exist and flourish, often through state sanction. The research compares and contrasts transnational textualities (both lived and imagined) by using a postcolonial feminist-of-color lens. Such nodes as slavery, residential/boarding schools, incarceration, and immigration illustrate the need for multi-faceted dialogues between and about women of color.

Kiera Ladner.

Kiera Ladner, political studies
Chair in Miyo we’citowin, Indigenous Governance & Digital Sovereignties

Focusing on theoretical and community-based research, this program of research will deepen understanding of decolonization, reconciliation, and resurgence within Canada and Anglo-settler societies. Ladner’s research program will interrogate and pursues miyo-we’citowin, governance and community-based research through four major projects: 1) a comparative project on treaties which focuses on treaty narratives and their potential for decolonization; 2) a comparative constitutional law and Indigenous politics participatory digital archive project seeking to radically transform data collection and knowledge mobilization; 3) a collaborative Indigenous archives project addressing intellectual sovereignty and community-based research; and 4) a research and community outreach initiative on decolonizing governance and rebuilding communities. 

Lorenzo Livi.

Lorenzo Livi, computer science
Chair in Complex Data
Coming from the University of Exeter, UK

Many natural and man-made systems are now observable with a high level of detail, allowing us to investigate and understand phenomena with an unprecedented level of sophistication. However, data describing such systems require complex representations encoding both temporal and spatial information. Livi’s research program will: 1) design data-driven methods to process spatio-temporal information represented as evolving graphs; 2) unravel the inner mechanisms explaining the functioning of (artificial) recurrent neural networks; 3) apply data-driven methods in structural biology and computational neuroscience for solving basic scientific problems having impact on society and health care.

Lisa Lix.

Lisa Lix, community health sciences
Chair in Methods for Electronic Health Data Quality

Electronic health databases, which contain digital information about an individual’s health and health care use, have significant potential to improve the population health. However, the accuracy and completeness of data in electronic medical records, registries, and administrative databases poses an ongoing challenge. Dr. Lix’s research will develop methods to measure and improve the quality of electronic health databases for studying chronic health conditions and predicting disease risk. Her research will lead to better health information systems for health care decision-making.

Sabine Mai.

Sabine Mai, physiology and pathophysiology, Research Institute of Oncology and Hematology, CancerCare Manitoba
Chair in Genomic Instability and Nuclear Architecture in Cancer

Global incidences of cancer are expected to increase by 68 per cent between 2012 and 2030, according to Cancer Research UK. The genomic complexity of cancer requires new insights to provide treatment decisions that are truly personalized for each patient. Dr. Mai’s novel and transformative research will focus on genomic instability and alterations in nuclear genome architecture followed by the translation of these findings into the clinic to achieve personalized medicine solutions.

“Canada is home to exceptional health researchers,” said Dr. Alain Beaudet, President of CIHR. “Our new Foundation Grants will provide stable, long-term support to some of these top minds so that they have the time and resources needed to find new ways of preventing disease, managing chronic conditions and enhancing health care delivery.”

“I congratulate these national leaders in health research on their success in receiving this funding,” says Digvir Jayas, Vice-President (Research and International). “This research will have direct impacts on the health of Manitobans and reach beyond the local community to national and international populations.”

Foundation Grants provide long-term support for Canada’s research leaders to undertake innovative and high impact programs of research. The Open Operating Grants invest in research and knowledge translation projects across the full spectrum of health.

Together, these two programs support the best ideas proposed by Canada’s health researchers. Recipients of these grants were selected through a rigorous peer-review process – the internationally accepted benchmark for ensuring quality and excellence in scientific research.

The Foundation Grants awarded

Tracie Afifi (community health sciences) $883,855 for the project titled “Preventing child maltreatment: Changing a child’s trajectory, improving health, and strengthening families.”

Lisa Lix (community health sciences/George & Fay Yee Centre for Healthcare Innovation/Manitoba Centre for Health Policy) $962,920 for the project titled “Advancing the science of data quality for electronic health databases: Applications to chronic disease research and surveillance.”

Jitender Sareen (psychiatry) $1,886,078 for the project titled “Defining the longitudinal course, outcomes, and treatment needs of vulnerable Canadians with posttraumatic stress disorder.”

The Open Operating Grant recipients

Marni Brownell (community health sciences/Manitoba Centre for Health Policy/Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba) $116,250 for the project titled “Neonatal and childhood neurodevelopmental, health and educational outcomes of children exposed to antidepressants and maternal depression during pregnancy.”

Kevin Coombs (medical microbiology/Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba) $657,715 for the project titled “Signaling perturbations during influenza virus replication and pathogenesis.”

Allison Dart (pediatrics & child health/Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba) $881,609 for the project titled “An assessment of psychological factors, inflammatory biomarkers and kidney complications; the improving renal Complications in Adolescents with type 2 diabetes through REsearch (iCARE) cohort study.”

Sanjiv Dhingra (physiology/St-Boniface Hospital Research) $521,185 for the project titled “Preserving the immunoprivilege of transplanted allogeneic mesenchymal stem cells in the ischemic heart.”

Keith Fowke (medical microbiology) $100,000 for the project titled “Understanding HIV-mediated innate immune dysregulation: The role of the immune inhibitory protein LAG-3.”

Phillip Gardiner (Faculty of Kinesiology & Recreation Management) $735,312 for the project titled “Aging effects on components of locomotion, and the impact of increased regular physical activity beginning in late adulthood.”

Jean-Eric Ghia (immunology/Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba) $100,000 for the project titled “Semaphorin 3E and Gut Inflammation.”

Lorrie Kirshenbaum (physiology/St-Boniface Hospital Research) $569,850 for the project titled “Targeting cell death signaling pathways in the heart.”

Donna Martin (nursing) $617,855 for the project titled “The micro- and macro-construction of induced displacement: Experiences, health outcomes and future plans of Little Saskatchewan First Nation.”

Leigh Murphy (biochemistry/medical genetics/cell biology/CancerCare Manitoba) $100,000 for the project titled “Beyond the estrogen receptor: Involvement of kinases in estrogen signaling in normal and malignant human breast epithelial cells.”

Tabrez Siddiqui (physiology) $795,210 for the project titled “Regulation of a neuronal synaptic pathway in neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders.”

Carolyn Snider (emergency medicine/Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba) $100,000 for the project titled “Wraparound care for youth injured by violence: A randomized control trial.”

Roberta Woodgate (nursing/St-Boniface Hospital Research/Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba) $428,986 for the project titled “The Journey for survivors of childhood brain tumours: From post-treatment into adolescence and adulthood.”