“These three CRCs demonstrate the exceptional quality of the work conducted by our researchers, as well as the notable relevance of the topics they explore,” said Vice-President, Research and Innovation Sylvain Charbonneau. “Thanks to CRC program support, our research teams will rigorously investigate some of the most pressing social, economic, environmental, and health issues of our time, and their findings will make a real difference in the lives of the public at large.”
New Tier 1 Canada Research Chair
Ana Maria Peredo (Telfer School of Management): Canada Research Chair in Social and Inclusive Entrepreneurship
Professor Peredo’s research focuses on the way that communities can mobilize the resources they possess to address urgent problems, including poverty, inequality, exclusion, environmental challenges, and post-war settings. This Canada Research Chair will allow Professor Peredo to explore the dynamics of “community-based enterprises” in meeting these grand challenges, including initiatives on the part of Indigenous communities to advance their well-being while recovering from colonization.
This work is part of her concern with the changes we need in our basic ways of organizing, to deal with the bundle of crises that face humanity, from inequality and climate change to social and environmental justice.
New Tier 2 Canada Research Chair
Hawre Jalal (Faculty of Medicine): Canada Research Chair in Health Economics
Professor Jalal’s research focuses on priority settings in public health. His research involves a broad range of conditions, including COVID-19, drug abuse and cancer. By evaluating health interventions and policies, this researcher hopes to change the way in which public policies are shaped to achieve more positive health, economic, and social outcomes. Hawre Jalal takes an approach that centres on the specific challenges faced by those most affected, for example, by drug addiction. Hence, according to this researcher, vulnerable populations, such as the homeless, the incarcerated, and other marginalized groups, should be central to public policies related to substance abuse.
This professor has founded key collaborative groups to promote Open Science by bringing members of the scientific community together, and fostering transparency, reproducibility, and greater use of health economic evaluations.
Renewed Tier 2 Canada Research Chair is held by
Mireille Ouimet (Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa Heart Institute): Canada Research Chair in Cardiovascular Metabolism and Cell Biology
Professor Ouimet’s research seeks to remedy one of the most common and insidious forms of heart disease: atherosclerosis. This disease occurs when cholesterol deposits build up in the artery wall, causing arteries to shrink and harden. Although there are drugs to stop this accumulation, it is very difficult to reverse its effects on the body.
The renewal of this CRC will allow this researcher to investigate the mechanisms of lipid autophagy, a fundamental cellular process that could regulate immunometabolism. Finding a way to control it would bring us closer to the most effective solutions to combat atherosclerosis.