The maintenance and construction of durable and resilient road infrastructure is a major challenge across Canada, but particularly in northern communities, as the degradation of underlying permafrost and increased freeze-thaw cycles due to climate warming have severely affected the performance of many roads built in Canada. The CRC in Cold Regions Roads will aim to develop advanced knowledge and innovative engineering techniques to not only make our existing road transportation infrastructure resilient to climate change and variability, but also to enable the construction of new, sustainable, climate-resilient roads in cold regions in the future. Sustainable and Climate Resilient Road Transportation Infrastructure is a key priority for the federal, provincial, municipal levels of government in Canada. Moreover, many engineering firms are looking for appropriate and sustainable solutions to these problems. Thus, the chairholder and their research team will have the opportunity to work on the problems identified by government and/or industry collaborators/partners and develop innovative solutions.
The University of Ottawa is located on the unceded ancestral territory of the Algonquin people in the heart of the nation's capital. It is one of Canada's top ten research-intensive universities and the largest bilingual English/French university in the world. The Faculty of Engineering provides a learning environment that promotes excellence and innovation, with a strong emphasis on entrepreneurial design. Excellence and diversity in research are built on strong collaboration with industry and government research institutions, many of which are located in the nation’s capital. The Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Ottawa maintains active research programs in Geotechnical Engineering, Structural Engineering, Water Resources Engineering, Environmental Engineering, Civil Engineering Materials, and Construction Management. The Department has a fully equipped state-of-the-art research and teaching Geotechnical Engineering Laboratory.
Tier 2 Canada Research Chairs, tenable for five years and renewable once, are for exceptional emerging researchers, acknowledged by their peers as having the potential to lead in their field. For each Tier 2 Chair, the institution receives $100,000 annually for five years, with an additional $20,000 annual research stipend for first-term Tier 2 Chairs. In addition, new CRC nominees are also eligible for infrastructure support from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) to help acquire state-of-the-art equipment essential to their work.
Candidates should, at a minimum, be assistant or associate professors, or possess the necessary qualifications to be appointed to these levels. Candidates who are more than 10 years from their highest degree must contact the University of Ottawa directly for questions related to their potential eligibility for a Tier 2 Chair. The institution may nominate a professor or a researcher who is more than 10 years from their highest degree at the time of nomination and has experienced legitimate career interruptions (see acceptable justifications). In such cases, the institution must submit to the Secretariat a formal justification (using the Tier 2 Justification Screening Form), explaining why the nominee is still considered to be an emerging scholar. The University recognizes the legitimate impact that leaves (e.g., parental leave, leave due to illness) can have on a candidate’s record of research achievement and that these leaves will be taken into careful consideration during the assessment process.