Polanyi Prize / en Three 91勛圖 researchers win Polanyi Prize for work in astronomy, English and medicine /news/three-u-t-researchers-win-polanyi-prize-work-astronomy-english-and-medicine <span class="field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden">Three 91勛圖 researchers win Polanyi Prize for work in astronomy, English and medicine</span> <div class="field field--name-field-featured-picture field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="eager" srcset="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/polanyi.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=k1jKskby 370w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_740/public/polanyi.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=mudBreZt 740w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_1110/public/polanyi.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=uHXdofCn 1110w" sizes="(min-width:1200px) 1110px, (max-width: 1199px) 80vw, (max-width: 767px) 90vw, (max-width: 575px) 95vw" width="740" height="494" src="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/polanyi.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=k1jKskby" alt="Portraits of Audrey Walton, Mamatha Bhat, Maria Drout "> </div> <span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>geoff.vendeville</span></span> <span class="field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden"><time datetime="2020-02-04T11:01:35-05:00" title="Tuesday, February 4, 2020 - 11:01" class="datetime">Tue, 02/04/2020 - 11:01</time> </span> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-field-cutline-long field--type-text-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Cutline</div> <div class="field__item">91勛圖's three Polanyi prize-winners (from left to right): Audrey Walton, Mamatha Bhat and Maria Drout (all photos by Nick Iwanyshyn)</div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-reporters field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/chris-sasaki" hreflang="en">Chris Sasaki</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/jovana-jankovic" hreflang="en">Jovana Jankovic</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/liam-mitchell" hreflang="en">Liam Mitchell</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-topic field--type-entity-reference field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Topic</div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/topics/our-community" hreflang="en">Our Community</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-story-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/astronomy-astrophysics" hreflang="en">Astronomy &amp; Astrophysics</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/centre-medieval-studies" hreflang="en">Centre for Medieval Studies</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/english" hreflang="en">English</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/faculty-arts-science" hreflang="en">Faculty of Arts &amp; Science</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/faculty-medicine" hreflang="en">Faculty of Medicine</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/john-polanyi" hreflang="en">John Polanyi</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/polanyi-prize" hreflang="en">Polanyi Prize</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/university-health-network" hreflang="en">University Health Network</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/vivek-goel" hreflang="en">Vivek Goel</a></div> </div> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>Three 91勛圖 researchers, all rising stars in their respective fields, have been awarded the prestigious John Charles Polanyi Prize.&nbsp;</p> <p>The 91勛圖 winners are&nbsp;<strong>Mamatha Bhat&nbsp;</strong>of the Faculty of Medicine and the University Health Network (UHN), <strong>Maria Drout&nbsp;</strong>of the David A. Dunlap Department of Astronomy &amp; Astrophysics and<strong> Audrey Walton</strong> of the department of English both in the Faculty of Arts &amp; Science.</p> <p>To receive this prize is an enormous achievement, says<strong>&nbsp;Vivek Goel</strong>, 91勛圖's vice-president, research and innovation, and strategic initiatives.&nbsp;</p> <p>The Polanyi prize is an important honour and a clear sign that an early-career researcher's work is having an impact.</p> <p>The $20,000 annual prizes, funded by the Ontario government and awarded by the Council of Ontario Universities, are given to five outstanding researchers in the early stages of their career who are pursuing post-doctoral studies or who have recently been appointed faculty at an Ontario university. The prizes are distributed among five fields: chemistry, physics, economic science, physiology/medicine and literature.</p> <p>Bhat, an assistant professor in the department of medicine and a staff hepatologist and clinician-scientist at UHN,&nbsp;was recognized&nbsp;for her research into the long-term health outcomes of patients after a liver transplant. Drout, an assistant professor of astronomy and astrophysics,&nbsp;was honoured for her work in the new field of&nbsp;multi-messenger astronomy. Walton, an assistant professor of English who is also at the Centre for Medieval Studies,&nbsp;received the prize for her research showing that medieval England produced a large body of literature in the vernacular as opposed to Latin.</p> <p>The award is named after&nbsp;<strong>John Polanyi</strong>, a 91勛圖 <a href="https://www.provost.utoronto.ca/awards-funding/university-professors/">University Professor</a> of chemistry and joint winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for contributions concerning the dynamics of chemical elementary processes.</p> <div align="center"> <hr align="center" noshade="noshade" size="2" width="100%"></div> <h3>Mamatha Bhat: Improving long-term outcomes for liver-transplant patients&nbsp;</h3> <h3><img class="migrated-asset" src="/sites/default/files/0130MamathaBhat001087A0484.jpg" alt></h3> <p><em>(photo by Nick Iwanyshyn)</em></p> <p>Mamatha Bhat became fascinated with the liver as a resident in gastroenterology at McGill University during her hepatology rotation.&nbsp;</p> <p>It performs hundreds of functions that most people arent even aware of, she says.</p> <p>She went on to complete a fellowship in transplant hepatology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., followed by a PhD in medical biophysics with a focus on molecular and computational biology.&nbsp;</p> <p>Today, her research focuses on how to ensure the long-term health of patients after they undergo a liver transplant.&nbsp;</p> <p>When you look at the short-term health outcomes of liver transplant patients within the first year following the transplant, success rates have increased substantially over the last 30 years. But when you look at long-term survival and outcomes beyond one year, there has been very little improvement, she says.&nbsp;</p> <p>A lot of the focus of clinical research has been on ensuring the organ isnt rejected by the patients immune system. However, Bhat says long-term considerations, including an increased risk of cancer and metabolic disease, have not been as thoroughly investigated.&nbsp;</p> <p>Its a problem that is becoming more pronounced as more Ontarians receive a liver transplant&nbsp;and as higher success rates mean transplant patients live longer.</p> <p>Based in UHNs Multi-Organ Transplant Program, the largest adult transplant program in North America, Bhat is well positioned to tackle the challenge. Last year, UHN performed more than 700 transplants, including more than 200 liver transplants.</p> <p>Emphasizing the need for translational research, Bhat is leading a team that includes both lab-based and clinical trainees at different stages of training.</p> <p>I find the best research emerges from the exchanges between trainees and researchers, she says. Each brings their own perspective whether its a focus on clinical care or lab-based knowledge. The back-and-forth of new ideas leads to some exciting outcomes.</p> <p>Winning the Polanyi Prize in Physiology/Medicine is a great honour,&nbsp;says Bhat, adding that it speaks to larger research goals.&nbsp;</p> <p>Its a wonderful sign of support for the importance of this translational research that will provide improved long-term outcomes for our patients, she says. Thats what means the most.</p> <h3>Maria Drout: Ushering in a new era of astronomical research&nbsp;</h3> <h3><img class="migrated-asset" src="/sites/default/files/0204MariaDrout001.jpg" alt></h3> <p><em>(photo by Nick Iwanyshyn)</em></p> <p>In August 2017, Drout and her collaborators witnessed an event that had never been seen before: a kilonova an explosion resulting from the collision of two neutron stars. But what made the observation truly historic was the fact that the stellar merger that created the explosion in a galaxy 130 million light-years away also generated gravitational waves that were detected here on Earth.</p> <p>It was the first time a single cosmic phenomenon was observed in both visible light and gravitational waves, ushering in the multi-messenger era in astronomy.</p> <p>For her research in this new field, as well as the study of short-lived events like supernovas and the evolution of massive stars, Maria Drout was awarded the Polanyi Prize in Physics.&nbsp;</p> <p>Im incredibly honoured to receive the prize, says Drout. John Polanyi is an inspiration not only because of his dedication to groundbreaking research, but because of his ability to effect real change that benefits the world.</p> <p>I hope to honour this legacy by continuing my work and by building new initiatives to promote effective science communication across Canada."</p> <p>Drouts research is providing insight into multiple areas of investigation: the fundamental physics of matter in extreme conditions; the origin of the heaviest elements on the periodic table; and new and unusual types of explosions that challenge our theoretical understanding of stellar death. For example, Drout led the analysis of observations of the kilonova that proved heavy elements like gold and platinum were created in neutron star mergers and not as had been proposed for decades in supernovas.</p> <p>The Polyani Prize is wonderful recognition of Marias highly innovative research, which has seen her rise to international prominence within a few years of receiving her PhD, says Professor&nbsp;<strong>Ray Carlberg</strong>, chair of the astronomy and astrophysics department.</p> <h3>Audrey Walton: Understanding medieval England's role in popularizing the vernacular</h3> <h3><img class="migrated-asset" src="/sites/default/files/0129AudreyWalton001.jpg" alt></h3> <p><em>(photo by Nick Iwanyshyn)</em></p> <p>Audrey Waltons award-winning scholarship focuses on sacred language, literary cultures, vernacularity and world religions with particular focus on the early medieval period in England.&nbsp;</p> <p>Walton was awarded the Polanyi Prize in Literature for her ongoing work on how and why medieval England was a European leader in developing a large body of literature in the vernacular, meaning a local native language rather than Latin.</p> <p>While established scholarship has focused on the notion that medieval authors viewed Latin as sacred, Waltons work challenges this assumption and shows that English authors often blurred the boundary between local speech and standardized sacred language. Her research aims to revise the conventional understanding of the historical development of European literature.</p> <p>More generally, Waltons work is concerned with multilingualism, linguistic divides and the exchange of ideas across regions in medieval Europe, with particular focus on social, political and religious developments concurrent with these phenomena.</p> <p>We are all immensely proud of Audrey, says Professor&nbsp;<strong>Paul Stevens</strong>, chair of 91勛圖s English department.&nbsp;</p> <p>Audrey joins five other members of the department in winning this prestigious award <strong>Angela Esterhammer</strong>,&nbsp;<strong>Andrea Most</strong>,&nbsp;<strong>Katie Larson</strong>,&nbsp;<strong>Andrea Charise</strong>&nbsp;and most recently&nbsp;<strong>Danny Wright</strong>, Stevens said.</p> <p>Its an outstanding group, remarkable for the rigour, originality and diversity of their research. Audreys work on the complex constitution of Anglo-Saxon textual culture is a revelation.</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-home-page-banner field--type-boolean field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">News home page banner</div> <div class="field__item">Off</div> </div> Tue, 04 Feb 2020 16:01:35 +0000 geoff.vendeville 162286 at Three 91勛圖 early-career researchers awarded prestigious Polanyi Prize /news/three-u-t-early-career-researchers-awarded-prestigious-polanyi-prize <span class="field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden">Three 91勛圖 early-career researchers awarded prestigious Polanyi Prize </span> <div class="field field--name-field-featured-picture field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="eager" srcset="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2019-01-18-polanyi-triptych%20%28002%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=5MReRSTQ 370w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_740/public/2019-01-18-polanyi-triptych%20%28002%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=3jy0Lsjr 740w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_1110/public/2019-01-18-polanyi-triptych%20%28002%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=gCYY9_gK 1110w" sizes="(min-width:1200px) 1110px, (max-width: 1199px) 80vw, (max-width: 767px) 90vw, (max-width: 575px) 95vw" width="740" height="494" src="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2019-01-18-polanyi-triptych%20%28002%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=5MReRSTQ" alt="Assistant Professor Husam Abdel-Qadir, post-doctoral researcher Jason Hunt and Assistant Professor Jiaying Gu"> </div> <span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>perry.king</span></span> <span class="field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden"><time datetime="2019-01-22T00:00:00-05:00" title="Tuesday, January 22, 2019 - 00:00" class="datetime">Tue, 01/22/2019 - 00:00</time> </span> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-field-cutline-long field--type-text-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Cutline</div> <div class="field__item">Three 91勛圖 early-career researchers Assistant Professor Husam Abdel-Qadir, Assistant Professor Jiaying Gu and post-doctoral researcher Jason Hunt are three of five 2018 Polanyi Prize winners (all photos by Perry King)</div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-reporters field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/perry-king" hreflang="en">Perry King</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-topic field--type-entity-reference field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Topic</div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/topics/our-community" hreflang="en">Our Community</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-story-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/awards" hreflang="en">Awards</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/dunlap-institute-astronomy-astrophysics" hreflang="en">Dunlap Institute for Astronomy &amp; Astrophysics</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/economics" hreflang="en">Economics</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/faculty-staff" hreflang="en">Faculty &amp; Staff</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/faculty-arts-science" hreflang="en">Faculty of Arts &amp; Science</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/faculty-medicine" hreflang="en">Faculty of Medicine</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/polanyi-prize" hreflang="en">Polanyi Prize</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/research-innovation" hreflang="en">Research &amp; Innovation</a></div> </div> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p><strong>Husam Abdel-Qadir</strong> is making strides in breast&nbsp;cancer treatment.<strong> Jason Hunt</strong> is giving a clearer vision of our galaxy. <strong>Jiaying Gu</strong> is making economic behaviour more accessible.</p> <p>The 91勛圖 researchers are among this years winners of the John Charles Polanyi Prize, which recognizes researchers in the early stages of their career&nbsp; pursuing post-doctoral studies or having recently been appointed as faculty at an Ontario university. The $20,000 prizes, awarded by the Council of Ontario Universities,&nbsp;are named after 91勛圖 <a href="https://www.provost.utoronto.ca/awards-funding/university-professors/">University Professor</a> <strong>John Polanyi</strong>, who received the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.</p> <p>Of the five Polanyi Prize recipients&nbsp;this year, three are 91勛圖 researchers.</p> <p>"The 91勛圖 is proud of our researchers who are being recognized for their contributions to medicine, astrophysics and economics, said <strong>Vivek Goel</strong>, 91勛圖's vice-president of research and innovation.&nbsp;</p> <p>"The prize is a significant early-career recognition that they are having an impact. It really helps to raise the profile for these researchers and gives them further opportunities as they continue in their careers.</p> <p>Meet this year's&nbsp;winners from 91勛圖:</p> <hr> <h3>Husam Abdel-Qadir: Researching the link between breast cancer treatment and cardiovascular condition</h3> <p><img alt class="media-image attr__typeof__foaf:Image img__fid__9966 img__view_mode__media_large attr__format__media_large" height="453" src="/sites/default/files/Husam%20Abdel-Qadir_0.jpg" typeof="foaf:Image" width="680" loading="lazy"></p> <p>Dr, Husam Abdel-Qadir, an assistant professor in 91勛圖s department of medicine, is being recognized for his focus on the cardiovascular health of breast cancer survivors. As a clinician-scientist at Womens College Hospital and University Health Network, he examines the suspected link between breast cancer treatments including chemotherapy and radiation therapy with the development of heart diseases, including atrial fibrillation, a serious heart rhythm abnormality.</p> <p>In previous research involving the rates of hospitalization for women with heart problems after breast cancer, Abdel-Qadir found that women who had breast cancer had a higher risk of atrial fibrillation. He's now working to prove the link by studying data on all women in Ontario who were diagnosed with early stage breast cancer between 1988 and 2016, and comparing the data to women with no history of cancer.</p> <p>He says he sees the Polanyi Prize as positive reinforcement of the work hes pursuing.</p> <p>My career&nbsp;trajectory has involved a lot of delayed gratification, he said, adding that he&nbsp;has spent almost 20 years as a postsecondary&nbsp;student.</p> <p>He considers it a privilege to both practise medicine and conduct relevant&nbsp;research.&nbsp;To walk down that path requires positive feedback to keep you motivated, and getting awards along the way, in particular the Polanyi Prize, is a very powerful form of positive motivation, said Abdel-Qadir, who is also the director of continuing professional development for the Black Physicians Association of Ontario.</p> <p>Abdel-Qadir has also received an early-career chair in women's heart and brain health from the Heart &amp; Stroke Foundation and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) to support his work. He aims to use this chair to&nbsp;bring more structured solutions to patients with complicated health profiles.</p> <p>I want to develop a better understanding of breast cancer patients' level of depression, anxiety and stress and I want to see how that relates to their social environment, he said.</p> <h3>Jiaying Gu: 'Bringing the economic theory to the data'</h3> <p><img alt class="media-image attr__typeof__foaf:Image img__fid__9970 img__view_mode__media_large attr__format__media_large" src="/sites/default/files/jiaying-gu-crop.jpg" style="width: 302px; height: 453px; float: left; margin-left: 20px; margin-right: 20px;" typeof="foaf:Image"></p> <p><strong>Jiaying Gu</strong>, an assistant professor in the department of economics, was awarded the&nbsp;Polanyi Prize for her work that focuses on&nbsp;econometrics, which emphasizes the use of statistical methods in describing economic behaviour. She is seeking to understand the impact of an individuals tastes and economic choices on the larger economic landscape.</p> <p>The practice of econometrics, explaining traits like heterogeneity and employing multi-linear regression models, can be dense and complicated. But Gu has been working at translating the discipline into terms that the public can easily understand beginning in the classroom.</p> <p>I do try to emphasize the kind of application, the methodology that Im developing that can help to apply in real-life situations, said Gu.</p> <p>She is using the data to better understand purchasing decisions, and&nbsp;describes it as "bringing the economic theory to the data."</p> <p>One example of her work involves teachers' performance evaluations. Teachers are often judged on&nbsp;student grades, but their evaluations often don't factor in individual teaching styles. By analyzing data from U.S. primary schools, she is hoping to develop a fairer method of evaluating teachers.</p> <p>She says the Polanyi Prize was a welcome bit of news.</p> <p>It was definitely a very pleasant surprise, Gu said. If the work is very technical, then its harder for a big audience to accept, so its certainly very encouraging, and Ill definitely continue to produce high-quality research. [The prize] relieves some pressure as well going forward.</p> <h3>Jason Hunt: Answering galactic questions</h3> <h3><img alt="Jason Hunt" class="media-image attr__typeof__foaf:Image img__fid__9830 img__view_mode__media_original attr__format__media_original" src="/sites/default/files/Jason%20Hunt%202.jpg" style="width: 750px; margin: 10px; height: 500px;" typeof="foaf:Image"></h3> <p>The core of the work of Jason Hunt, a post-doctoral researcher at the 91勛圖s Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics, revolves around the structure and dynamics of the Milky Way. As part of a global consortium of researchers, Hunt uses raw data obtained from the Gaia mission, a deep space probe launched by the European Space Agency, to uncover our galaxys many mysteries.</p> <p>He received his PhD&nbsp;in 2015 from the Mullard Space Science Laboratory at University College in London&nbsp;and has been working with&nbsp;91勛圖 Assistant Professor&nbsp;<strong>Jo Bovy</strong>&nbsp;since 2016.</p> <p>Were getting detailed positions and motions of about 1.5 billion stars, and this is orders of magnitude more data 簫 both in terms of quality and quantity than weve ever had before, said Hunt, who began his digging with Gaia in 2013.</p> <p>He added that despite what we know about our home galaxy, theres still an innumerable amount we do not, including the number of stars in the Milky Way.</p> <p>Its important for a lot of things and its still not super well constrained, said the native of Devon, England. Even Gaia, you would see only one per cent of the stars.</p> <p>"It's up to us to try and work out what else is there.</p> <p>About the Polanyi Prize, Hunt says he's "pretty proud to be within that same bracket of people, looking back over the past winners."</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-home-page-banner field--type-boolean field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">News home page banner</div> <div class="field__item">Off</div> </div> Tue, 22 Jan 2019 05:00:00 +0000 perry.king 149232 at Two up-and-coming 91勛圖 researchers win Polanyi Prize /news/two-and-coming-u-t-researchers-win-polanyi-prize <span class="field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden">Two up-and-coming 91勛圖 researchers win Polanyi Prize</span> <div class="field field--name-field-featured-picture field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="eager" srcset="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2017-11-15-Polanyi-composite-%28weblead%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=fyzRFsIn 370w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_740/public/2017-11-15-Polanyi-composite-%28weblead%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=_4iChb3X 740w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_1110/public/2017-11-15-Polanyi-composite-%28weblead%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=Dg85sp0n 1110w" sizes="(min-width:1200px) 1110px, (max-width: 1199px) 80vw, (max-width: 767px) 90vw, (max-width: 575px) 95vw" width="740" height="494" src="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2017-11-15-Polanyi-composite-%28weblead%29.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=fyzRFsIn" alt="Photos of Veroniki and Mourifi矇"> </div> <span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>Christopher.Sorensen</span></span> <span class="field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden"><time datetime="2017-11-15T10:16:50-05:00" title="Wednesday, November 15, 2017 - 10:16" class="datetime">Wed, 11/15/2017 - 10:16</time> </span> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-field-cutline-long field--type-text-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Cutline</div> <div class="field__item">Areti Angeliki Veroniki is a statistician and scientist at St. Michael's Hospital and Ismael Mourifi矇 is an assistant professor in 91勛圖's department of economics (photos courtesy of Council of Ontario Universities)</div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-reporters field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/chris-sorensen" hreflang="en">Chris Sorensen</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-topic field--type-entity-reference field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Topic</div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/topics/our-community" hreflang="en">Our Community</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-story-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/faculty-arts-science" hreflang="en">Faculty of Arts &amp; Science</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/faculty-medicine" hreflang="en">Faculty of Medicine</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/john-polanyi" hreflang="en">John Polanyi</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/polanyi-prize" hreflang="en">Polanyi Prize</a></div> </div> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p><strong>Areti Angeliki Veroniki</strong> is a studier of studies.&nbsp;</p> <p>A scientist at the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute at St. Michaels Hospital, Veronikis post-doctoral research at the 91勛圖 is focused on pulling new insights from the hundreds of medical studies done on a particular illness right down to the level of individual patients.</p> <p>Working under the supervision of <strong>Dr. Sharon Straus</strong>, a professor in 91勛圖s Faculty of Medicine and a Canada research chair in knowledge translation and quality of care, Veroniki is performing whats known as an individual patient data network meta-analysis on studies pertaining to Type 1 diabetes and Alzheimers dementia.</p> <p>Put simply, its a statistical analysis of the many studies done on a number of clinical treatments related to a specific illness that, unlike more straightforward network meta-analyses, still takes into account individual data from all the studies patient participants.</p> <p>Were able to explore potential treatment-by-covariate interactions, which are interactions that may happen between the characteristics of the patients and the treatment effect that were not always able to see with aggregated data, says Veroniki, who did her PhD in epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of Ioannina in Greece.</p> <p>Were able to tailor the results for certain characteristics of patients that, previously, published studies didnt address. We can then use the data that has been previously collected to explore further treatment effects usually with greater power.</p> <p>Veroniki is one of two researchers at 91勛圖 who were honoured with this years Polanyi Prize, which was awarded to just five researchers in the province in total. The $20,000 prizes, in honour of 91勛圖 <a href="http://www.provost.utoronto.ca/awards/uprofessors.htm">University Professor&nbsp;</a><strong>John Charles Polanyi</strong>, who received the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, are given to up to five outstanding researchers in the early stages of their careers who are either pursuing post-doctoral studies or have recently been appointed faculty at an Ontario university.</p> <p>The other 91勛圖 winner is <strong>Ismael Mourifi矇</strong>, an assistant professor in 91勛圖s department of economics in the Faculty of Arts &amp; Science. His current research is focused on understanding why there aren't more women like Veroniki studying STEM subjects and working in related professions.</p> <h3><a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/why-dont-women-go-into-engineering-its-not-just-because-of-bias/article36984933/">Read about Mourifi矇's STEM research in the <em>Globe and Mail</em></a></h3> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Mourifi矇 says there are essentially two competing theories. The first hinges on the idea that women&nbsp; in STEM&nbsp; science, technology, engineering, mathematics are underpaid relative to their male counterparts and therefore decide to pursue fields with less wage discrimination. The other suggests that women are steered away from STEM&nbsp;subjects at an early age because theyre socialized to think they belong elsewhere.</p> <p>The problem, Mourifi矇 says, is the policy solutions are very different depending on which theory one ascribes to. If its the latter, he says, even if you mandate equal pay, women wont come and your policy wont work.</p> <p>Finding a policy solution is further complicated by the fact that what may work for a small group of survey subjects often cant be reliably scaled up to a larger population. Thats because its difficult to completely take into account the myriad attitudes and perspectives including those held by different cultural or generational groups that may lead women to shun STEM studies.</p> <p><img alt class="media-image attr__typeof__foaf:Image img__fid__6774 img__view_mode__media_large attr__format__media_large" height="453" src="/sites/default/files/2017-11-14-Ismael-Mourifie-%28web-embed%29.jpg" typeof="foaf:Image" width="680" loading="lazy"></p> <p><em>91勛圖's Ismael&nbsp;Mourifi矇&nbsp;says his experiences as a new immigrant has helped shape his research&nbsp;(photo by Chris Sorensen)</em></p> <p>Mourifi矇 has personal experience with feeling pressured to do things against his wishes.</p> <p>Though he always wanted to pursue a career in the social sciences, when it came time to apply to university, he instead opted to accept a government scholarship to pursue a bachelors degree in math and physics at Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah University in Morocco. Why? His home country of C繫te d'Ivoire was spiralling into civil war and, given his math skills, he figured it would be the most expedient way to secure a spot studying abroad.</p> <p>It was not a decision that was being made based on my preferences, he says.</p> <p>Even after arriving in Canada, Mourifi矇 says he sometimes felt like he was being subtly discouraged from trying to complete his PhD in economics at the University of Montreal, including by well-meaning members of his own community. They felt it wasnt realistic for someone of African heritage to aspire to become an economics professor, he says.</p> <p>One thing thats very important to me is to show new immigrants the new generation that being African and coming from a small country is not something that should shape your future in Canada, Mourifi矇 says. If you work hard, you should be able to make your path.</p> <p>It should be the same thing for women."</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-home-page-banner field--type-boolean field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">News home page banner</div> <div class="field__item">Off</div> </div> Wed, 15 Nov 2017 15:16:50 +0000 Christopher.Sorensen 122035 at 91勛圖 literature and physics researchers recognized with Polanyi Prizes /news/u-t-literature-and-physics-researchers-recognized-polanyi-prizes <span class="field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden">91勛圖 literature and physics researchers recognized with Polanyi Prizes</span> <div class="field field--name-field-featured-picture field--type-image field--label-hidden field__item"> <img loading="eager" srcset="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2016-11-15-polanyi-prizes.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=vDj82EDi 370w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_740/public/2016-11-15-polanyi-prizes.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=ecolGvl7 740w, /sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_1110/public/2016-11-15-polanyi-prizes.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=-rrNdQRt 1110w" sizes="(min-width:1200px) 1110px, (max-width: 1199px) 80vw, (max-width: 767px) 90vw, (max-width: 575px) 95vw" width="740" height="494" src="/sites/default/files/styles/news_banner_370/public/2016-11-15-polanyi-prizes.jpg?h=afdc3185&amp;itok=vDj82EDi" alt="Photo of Ioannis (John) Antoniadis and Daniel Wright"> </div> <span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>ullahnor</span></span> <span class="field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden"><time datetime="2016-11-15T12:32:22-05:00" title="Tuesday, November 15, 2016 - 12:32" class="datetime">Tue, 11/15/2016 - 12:32</time> </span> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-field-cutline-long field--type-text-long field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Cutline</div> <div class="field__item">91勛圖 researchers Ioannis (John) Antoniadis and Daniel Wright were named today as Polanyi Prize winners </div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-reporters field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/authors-reporters/jennifer-robinson" hreflang="en">Jennifer Robinson</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-author-legacy field--type-string field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Author legacy</div> <div class="field__item">Jennifer Robinson</div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-topic field--type-entity-reference field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">Topic</div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/topics/global-lens" hreflang="en">Global Lens</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-story-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/polanyi-prize" hreflang="en">Polanyi Prize</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/awards" hreflang="en">Awards</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/research" hreflang="en">Research</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/humanities" hreflang="en">Humanities</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/dunlap-institute-astronomy-astrophysics" hreflang="en">Dunlap Institute for Astronomy &amp; Astrophysics</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/utm" hreflang="en">UTM</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news/tags/english" hreflang="en">English</a></div> </div> <div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>Two 91勛圖 researchers, <strong>Daniel Wright </strong>and <strong>Ioannis (John) Antoniadis</strong>, have won Polanyi Prizes &nbsp;Wright for his work examining the political creativity of Victorian poets and novelists&nbsp;and Antoniadis for his research into pulsars as laboratories to study fundamental physics.</p> <p>Its a real honour. Its heartening that a prize like the Polanyi recognizes the humanities alongside fields like the sciences and medicine, said&nbsp;Wright, an assistant professor in English at 91勛圖 Mississauga.</p> <p>Also among this year's winners is alumnus <strong>Stephen Newman</strong>. Newman, who earned his PhD at 91勛圖, is now assistant professor and Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in the University of Ottawas department of chemistry and biomolecular sciences.</p> <p>The prize, awarded by the <a href="http://cou.on.ca/">Council of Ontario Universities</a>, was created to honour the achievement of 91勛圖s <strong>John Charles Polanyi</strong>, who won the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.</p> <h3><a href="http://magazine.utoronto.ca/time-capsule/john-polanyi-canadian-nobel-prize-winner-chemistry/">Read about John Charles Polanyi</a></h3> <p>Up to five Polanyi prizes worth $20,000 are awarded each year to outstanding researchers in the early stages of their career who are continuing to post-doctoral studies or have recently started a faculty appointment at an Ontario university. They are available in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and economic science.</p> <p>Recipients of the Polanyi Prizes represent the best university-based researchers across Ontario, and this years group is no exception, said Deb Matthews, Ontarios minister of advanced education and skills development.</p> <h3><a href="http://www.vvcnetwork.ca/mtcu/20161115/">Watch a video of the award ceremony</a></h3> <p>Wrights research, which won in the literature category, examines the novels and poems of mid-19th century writers like Elizabeth Gaskell and Charles Dickens, who used their work to probe and draw larger public attention to the social problems of the Industrial Revolution.</p> <p>We often hold that literature has the power to cultivate new modes of sympathy, to change hearts and minds and to give form to complex political arguments, Wright said. And yet despite our hopeful conviction that literary art has political effects, we must also admit that these effects are diffuse, slow, unsteady and unpredictable.</p> <p>The political questions writers in the Victorian period wrestled with may be different than those we confront in the 21st century&nbsp;but their struggle with the question of a novelists or poets capacity to act as a leader of political change is one that remains relevant today, he explained.</p> <p>I argue that Victorian poets and novelists cope with the problem of the political ineffectuality of literary art through a multifaceted appeal to the cultivation of creativity as a political practice, he said. What I call political creativity is an absorption in the present moment by which the future is made multiple in its possibilities, radically open-ended and therefore radically malleable.</p> <p>The Polanyi winner in physics, Antoniadis, is a researcher at 91勛圖s <a href="http://www.dunlap.utoronto.ca/">Dunlap Institute for Astronomy &amp; Astrophysics</a>. In 2013, he was part of an international team that discovered the most massive neutron star to date &nbsp;PSR J0348+0432 &nbsp;which is located more than 5,000 light years from Earth in the Milky Way Galaxy. That may seem like a long way away &nbsp;and it is &nbsp;but in the vastness of space, its still located in the neighbourhood, he said.</p> <p>Neutron stars are both incredibly dense and very small, Antoniadis said. For example, PSR J0348+0432 is twice as heavy as the Sun but smaller than&nbsp;Toronto.</p> <p>They are also very stable rotators that resemble very precise clocks, which makes them ideal to study the underlying laws of physics like gravitational waves, but we dont know how physics work in their core, he said.</p> <p>Eventually, neutron stars turn into black holes&nbsp;but no one knows their tipping point yet, Antoniadis explained. Were not trying to find one that will collapse in real time.</p> <p>Canada and Toronto, in particular, is a magnet for this type of research since the pulsar community here is small but quite active, he says.</p> <p>And there is a lot of excitement about the CHIME project, also known as the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment, which is led by a team of Canadian cosmologists, including Dunlaps Assistant Professor&nbsp;<strong>Keith Vanderlinde</strong>.</p> <p>The new ground-breaking radio telescope at the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory in British Columbia will map the 21-centimetre signature of neutral hydrogen within the largest volume of space ever surveyed, encompassing a 3D swath of the universe that covers half the sky and is billions of light years deep.</p> <h3><a href="/news/polanyi-prize-goes-u-t-researcher-his-work-more-efficient-solar-materials">Read about last year's Polanyi Prize winner</a><a href="/news/polanyi-prize-goes-u-t-researcher-his-work-more-efficient-solar-materials">&nbsp;from 91勛圖</a></h3> <p>&nbsp;</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-home-page-banner field--type-boolean field--label-above"> <div class="field__label">News home page banner</div> <div class="field__item">Off</div> </div> Tue, 15 Nov 2016 17:32:22 +0000 ullahnor 102420 at