Team Science Dec 2007

H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y

M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S






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As I begin my third year as Dean here at the Faculty of Science,the air is filled with excited anticipation—not only because thecampus is buzzing away with activity after a relatively quiet

summer, but because the University has launched the most ambitiousfundraising campaign in Canadian university history and we are allhonoured to be part of it.When I say “we,” I mean it in the mostinclusive sensepossible. From ourdistinguisheddepartment chairsand professors, toour bright andhardworkingundergraduates, toour dedicatedsupport staff andyou—our impor-tant alumni,patrons andfriends—we areall key pieces thatform our presti-gious Faculty.

It is no idleboast to say thatMcGill’s scientistshave had a pro-found impact onour world. Indeed,the planet would bea very different place had our Faculty never existed. From JohnWilliam Dawson, the first Canadian-born scientist of worldwiderenown, to physicist and Nobel laureate Ernest Rutherford, to chemistand Nobel prizewinner Rudolph Marcus, McGill scientists have beenleaders, not followers.The challenge we face is ensuring that weenhance our established world-class position. I hope this specialnewsletter will give you a sense of the ambitious projects we are nowundertaking to secure the Faculty’s world leadership role, and of thecrucial need for support as we begin the public phase of theUniversity’s five-year capital campaign.

In the past few years alone, Faculty researchers linked growingincome inequality to extinction of plant and animal species, whilePsychology professor and Alfred P. Sloan Fellow Karim Nader, whoserecent memory consolidation discovery may help post-traumatic stressdisorder sufferers tune down unpleasant memories, is taking hisresearch to an even higher level, as you will read in the following

pages. Excellenceis indeed aningrained qualityhere at theFaculty ofScience. But asour Principal,Heather Munroe-Blum, pointed outat our campaignlaunch in mid-October, a proudpast is no guaran-tee of a proud orrelevant future.

The Faculty ispreparing to meetthe challenges ofthe future by lay-ing the necessarygroundworktoday.That is whywe have launched

a crucial campaign toraise a minimum of $61.7-million for our most important academicand research priorities.These include endowed chairs in a variety ofareas related to green science, neuroscience, psychology, women’shealth, outreach, and of course, student support for both graduates andundergraduates.As great as our history has been, the Faculty is today atthe cusp of even greater things. I ask for your support to help us seizethe opportunity while we have the chance.

C h a n g i n g t h e W o r l d

John William Dawson, McGill's Principal from 1855

to 1893, was the first Canadian-born scientist to

achieve worldwide recognition. A founding member

and first president of the Royal Society of Canada, he

was also a president of both the American and the

British associations for the Advancement of Science,

the only person to have done so.

As a physics professor in the Faculty of Science,

Ernest Rutherford was the first to conclude that

atoms could be transformed and that each atom

potentially carried a tremendous amount of energy.

His groundbreaking idea earned him the Nobel

Prize for Chemistry in 1908.

Faculty of Science | McGill University | 853 Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3A 2T6 December 2007

Dean of Science Martin Grant (centre) with (from left to right): science students Maxime Chevalier Boisvert, Anna King,Aviroop Biswas, Undergraduate Research Officer Victor Chisholm, Victoria Timmermanis and Susan Westfall

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T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S






Lorne Trottier’s modest office in Dorval is atestament to his dedication to science, datingto when he was a boy in Montreal buildingcrystal radios and flying model airplanes. Ona credenza behind Trottier’s desk sits a modelof the Saturn V rocket that launched men ona mission to the moon in 1969.The wallsare hung with photos of various galaxies, neb-ulae, and other sensational interstellar matter,including a collage from the 1980 CarlSagan television series, Cosmos.“That’s anold one,”Trottier sheepishly admits.

Trottier has welcomed many guests to hisDorval-based video graphics companyMatrox Electronic Systems, which he co-founded in 1976, but today he has a specialvisitor. Professor Vicky Kaspi, McGill’sLorne Trottier Chair in Astrophysics andCosmology, and Canada Research Chair inObservational Astrophysics—and an interna-tionally respected expert on neutron stars, thedense, fast-spinning remnants left after thecollapse of more massive stars—is looking ata poster of what appears to be a huge billow-ing pair of red gaseous clouds.“That’s EtaCarinae,” she says.While Kaspi explainsthat Eta Carinae is a luminous hypergiantstar (estimates of its mass range from 100 to150 times the mass of the Sun) Trottierpoints out that some astronomers have pre-dicted that the star may become a supernovain 10,000 to 20,000 years, wonderingaloud how this event, some 7,500 light-years away, might affect the Earth.

Trottier, who donated not only theendowed chair currently held by Kaspi but

has also supported McGill to the tune of some $22-million since he graduat-ed in 1970, is clearly knowledgeable in the science projects he funds and iseager to sit down and talk with Kaspi, who has just added the Urgel-Archambault Award from the Association francophone pour le savoir to herlist of achievements and awards.

Faculty of Science Communications Office Michael Woloschuk met withTrottier and Kaspi in October, to discuss their passion for science.Below is a transcript of the interview.

Vicky, when did you get interested in astronomy?

VK:There were a few little things that directed me.When I was nineor 10 years old, I read a book that had a big impact on me. It wascalled A Wrinkle in Time. It’s a kid’s book, but I remember loving it andthinking about it constantly.And I have to admit I liked Star Trek. I wasa big fan. I took it very seriously—they went on missions to do inter-esting things. I just thought it was wonderful.And I always liked sci-ence and math in school, and I always knew I’d do something in sci-ence. I just didn’t know what: I loved astronomy, but I also loved lots ofdifferent things in science. I could have gone in many different direc-tions, but I met my PhD supervisor and he had a good project and Ijust took off from there.

LT: I feel much the same way.When I was in high school, I had towrestle with what I wanted to do. Science in general interested me, butat some point somebody asked me what I wanted to be when I grewup and I said “scientist.” But then I realized I had to choose whichdirection.

VK:Yeah, it’s tough choosing.There are days—now I love what I’mdoing, I just love it—but I also wish I had more time to understandother things as well. I don’t have any regrets, but if tomorrow you said,“sorry you can’t do that anymore,” I would probably… I find neuro-science very interesting.

Lorne, what was your initial thinking in giving back to the Faculty of Science?

LT: My interest in astronomy goes back a long time. It’s not somethingI picked up yesterday—it was kind of natural for me. One of thebroad objectives I have in philanthropy is to support scientific knowl-edge of education at many different levels.And McGill has a specialplace in there because I went to McGill. Supporting astrophysicsresearch is like being a patron of the arts.You don’t have to be an artistto support the arts.And I’m a patron of science, I guess. It’s been fan-tastic.As an amateur, I think I have a pretty reasonable knowledge,perhaps more than the average person. But my interest in science cov-ers all aspects.The symposia are an example.The first one was onenergy and climate change and then we did the origin of the universeand this time it was the origin of life.All these origin questions are allvery, very deep fascinating questions for me. I enjoy reading about it, Ienjoy keeping up to date with the latest discoveries on a macro level.And if I can support these things and encourage other people todevelop their interests or their careers, it’s great. I’ve had a passion forscience all my life. Partly because I have a deep interest in it, and part-ly because I make a good living from a part of technology, electronics,so it’s good to encourage others to develop that interest as well. It’swhat motivates.

Science patron Lorne Trottier and renowned astrophysicist Vicky Kaspi talk about

growing up with a passion for science, their commitment to McGill, and more

W r i t t e n i n t h e S t a r s

Canada’s first female nuclear physicist HarrietBrooks worked with Ernest Rutherford and also

among the early discoverers of radon and the

first researcher to attempt to determine its

atomic mass.

Andrew G. McNaughton, a McGill MSc graduate,

went on to invent the cathode ray direction finder—

the direct forerunner of radar. McNaughton later sold

the patent for one dollar to the National Research

Council of Canada.

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S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S H I S T O R Y M A K E R S






Vicky, how do people like Lorne influencethe work you’re doing?

VK: Obviously, it’s wonderful. I mean, resources are everything and youwant to do world-class research but that means you have to compete on aworld scale. In my area, that means competing with Harvard and CalTech,and we need resources to do it.You can have all the ideas in the world,and that’s one thing we have—lots of ideas—but we need the people whopursue them to go to conferences and talk about them. So Lorne helpingus out is just tremendous.

We’ve picked some very carefully chosen areas in which we want toexcel.And in Canada certainly—I don’t want to boast too much—butthere’s a lot of evidence that we’re the best in Canada.And in certainareas, I think we are world leaders.There’s people in our department—I see people like Peter Grütter and Robert Brandenberger who aredoing work, interesting work, that is world-class.You can go anywherein the world and say,“These scientists work in my department” andpeople say “Wow.”

LT: Last summer,Vicky hosted the biggest gathering of specialists inneutron stars.Two hundred of the world’s top scientists and a couple ofNobel prizewinners came here, and she was the one who organizedthat, so it just shows how we can attract the best here at McGill.Vicky’svery well-known and people seek her out.

How important are McGill students, particularly undergrads in the department ’s big picture?

VK:At McGill I have to say, the students are excellent.When I came fromthe States I came from M.I.T., and I wondered if I would see the samecalibre of students—and I actually find that the students here are better.Why? In terms of intellect, of course, there are smart people everywhere.But it’s more an attitude. Maybe it’s just unique to the department I’m in,but at McGill students come in and they’re enthusiastic, they’re excited—where I was before, the students were a little more cynical.

When I started here I was the only woman in the department and Ithought I’d have trouble attracting students. But actually, I couldn’tkeep them out because people really love astronomy, or at least I findthat it’s such a great attractor of students. I was really blown away bytheir tremendous enthusiasm and work ethic. It’s just a different cul-ture, putting together a team. Since we study neutron stars across thespectrum, we use x-ray telescopes, optical telescopes, and these requirea team.We work as a team, we have group meetings, and we have thisgreat rapport.And I don’t know if it’s just because we don’t have thesame competitiveness but we work well as a group.And part of it is, Ican have a bigger team here, I can afford to have many more students.In the States, you know, you have resources, but not enough to have abig healthy group.

LT:Youth and enthusiasm are always good things, especially if they arechannelled in the right direction. I can tell you that McGill gets somepretty bright students. I experienced that first-hand when I went toMcGill in the sixties. It was actually a bit of a rude awakening for me, inthe sense that when I was in high school here in Montreal, we didn’t haveCEGEPs as we do now, and I came straight from Grade 11 to McGill. Ihad been the top student in my class and my high school for the pastcouple of years before graduating, but when I came here it was quite ashock.There were some brilliant guys hereand it took me a while to get up to speed.

VK:And I have to say that when I startedin the physics program at McGill, I neverworked so hard. It was a shock. I’ve hadundergraduates working with me who endup writing papers that get published injournals and they are thrilled. I mean, thisis just a dream come true for them, andthey ask really good questions.That’s theother thing, in other countries they doresearch in institutes, but here they ask youtough questions—they think about thingsfrom a direction you never imagined.

Vicky, where do you want to see your research go next?

VK:Well, lots of places and it depends onwhat day you ask me, but right now there’sa new NASA mission that will belaunched in 2011 and I’m starting to getinvolved in that. It’s called NuSTAR. I hadactually proposed to the Canadian SpaceAgency that we build part of it, but thatdidn’t go anywhere.

LT: It’s one of the things that’s interesting inthe age that we are living in right now. CarlSagan called it the Golden Age, and rightnow we’re at a stage when new technologyis allowing scientists to build better instru-ments and aim them at things that havenever been looked at before. If you build aninstrument like that and put it out there, youwill make discoveries.There’s no questionabout it.You will make lots of discoveries.

Thank you for your timeand the opportunity to talk.

Nuclear physicist and former McGill Principal

Robert Edward Bell invented the direct timing

method for measuring nuclear processes down

to a fraction of a billionth of a second, and the

discovery of proton radioactivity.

Wilder Penfield, Professor of Neurology and

Neurosurgery, revolutionized our understanding

of the human brain. The pioneering clinician and

neuroscientist was celebrated nationally and

internationally for what the Globe and Mail called

his "almost miraculous" achievements.

Sting’s Got Music on the Brain

Now in its 10thprinting at 150,000copies, This Is YourBrain on Music, byMcGill psychologyprofessor Daniel

Levitin, is a runawaybestseller. Here’swhat rock legendSting had to sayabout it:

Music seems to have an almost willful, evasivequality, defying simple explanation, so that themore we find out, the more there is to know, leav-ing its power and mystery intact, however much wemay dig and delve. Daniel’s book is an eloquentand poetic exploration of this paradox.There maybe no simple answer or end in sight, but the ride isnonetheless a thrilling one, especially in the compa-ny of a writer who is both an accomplished musi-cian, a hard nosed scientist, and someone who canstill look upon the universe with a sense of wonder.

Honorary Doctorate for McGill Astronaut

At McGill’s fall convocation ceremonies in November, Canadian astronaut and McGill alumnus Dr. David Williams, BSc’76, MSc’83,MDCM’83, was given an honorary Doctor of Science for his manyachievements since graduation. Former ER director at the SunnybrookHealth Sciences Centre in Toronto, Dr.Williams became the seventh

Canadian astronaut to venture into space, whenhe blasted off with the space shuttleColumbia in 1998 as the crew’s medicalofficer. Later, NASA appointed him directorof the Space and Life Sciences Directorateat the Johnson Space Center in Houston,

Texas. He was the first non-American tohold a senior management position

with the space agency. Dr.Williams continues to give

back to his alma mater.Most recently, he suggest-ed that the CanadianSpace Agency sponsor auniversity-wide contestat McGill, for students to

design a special patch forthe Endeavour mission tothe International SpaceStation this past August.

Kudos

Charles Gale, James McGill Professor in the Department of Physics, waselected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement ofScience (AAAS) in October for his distinguished contributions to thestudy of medium- and high-energy nuclear collisions. Gale, whoseresearch deals primarily with the theoretical study of strongly interact-ing matter under extreme conditions of temperature and density. Hewill be presented with an official certificate and rosette pin during theassociation’s 2008 annual meeting in Boston.

A paper on the use of water in organic chemistry by McGillchemist and Canada Research Chair in Green ChemistryChao-Jun (C.J.) Li has been named by the American ChemicalSociety (ACS) as one of its top five “hot papers.” Li’s article wasnamed because it was among the five most cited papers published by thesociety over the last two years. Li’s achievement is even more remarkablegiven that some 12,000 ACS papers were published in this period.

The 2007 Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research was presentedto McGill alumni Ralph M. Steinman, BSc’63, for his discovery of dendriticcells, the preeminent component of the immune system that initiates andregulates the body’s response to foreign antigens. Currently the Henry G.Kunkel Professor and Senior Physician with Rockefeller University,Steinman has opened up novel therapeutic avenues for combating cancerand pathogens. Since 1962, a total of 71 Lasker Award recipients have goneon to win the Nobel Prize, most within two years of receiving the Lasker.

Among those sharing the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Al Goreand his UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are McGill’svery own Nigel Roulet, director of the McGill School of Environmentand James McGill Professor of Geography and Mohan Munasinghe,PhD’73, a Sri Lankan scientist. Roulet was a contributing author to theclimate change panel report, and Munansinghe is vice-chairman of theaward-winning climate change panel.

McGill University physics professor Vicky Kaspi’s outstanding contributionto the world of astrophysics has been recognized with the prestigiousUrgel-Archambault Award from the Association francophone pour lesavoir. In 2005, Kaspi and her team discovered the fastest-rotating pulsarknown to science and more than 20 pulsars in a single star cluster in theMilky Way. Both findings yielded important new information about thenature of one of the most mysterious forms of matter in the universe.

Created in 1953, in honour of Urgel Archambault, the founder and firstdirector of l’École Polytechnique de Montréal, the prize is awarded annu-ally in recognition of outstanding work in the advancement of physics,mathematics, engineering or computer science.The Urgel-ArchambaultAward represents only the most recent of Kaspi’s many accolades. She wasrecently awarded the Rutherford Memorial Medal in Physics by theRoyal Society of Canada, and has also received the Canadian Associationof Physicists Herzberg Medal, the prestigious NSERC Steacie Prize, andthe Canadian Institute for Advanced Research Young Explorer Prize.

F a c u l t y a n d A l u m n i N e w s








Roger Daley, a McGill meteorologist, was the principal

constructor of the Canadian numerical weather

forecasting system. His numerical descriptions of the

atmosphere or variations of them form the basis of

virtually all forecasting and long-term climate

simulations in use everywhere in the world to this day.

By merging neurology and psychology, Brenda Milneris credited with creating the field of cognitive neuro-

science. Milner has been inducted into the National

Academy of Sciences (USA), the American Academy of

Arts and Sciences, the Royal Society of London and the

Royal Society of Canada.

Daniel Levitin

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Gordon Sumner, aka Sting

Dave Williams

With a range of research projects running from the psychology of terror-ism to the biology of proteins, the Faculty of Science’s Third AnnualUndergraduate Research Conference (URC) enlightened and enter-tained hundreds of visitors during Homecoming 2007 this past October.

This year, 56 students from across the Faculty of Science participated,showcasing 47 research projects in five categories: Biological Sciences,Earth System Science, Mathematical and Computational Sciences,Medical Sciences and Psychology and Physical Sciences.

Research is fast becoming a pillar of a McGill undergraduate education.The Faculty of Science’s Office for Undergraduate Research, whichorganizes the conference plans to increase the number of undergraduatestudents involved in research. This will expose them to the role of schol-arly exploration in the undergraduate experience.

“The conference is also important because it shows to the communitywhat our undergraduates are capable of and what they do achieve,” saidUndergraduate Research Officer Victor Chisholm.“This year, alumnipassed by the posters all day long and were very impressed. Someremarked at how it appeared that some of the presentations were ateither Master’s or PhD levels and were amazed that this research wasbeing accomplished by undergraduates.”

The conference was capped off by the awarding of prizes to the top twoposters in each category, and by a keynote address by Dr. Jonathan Foley,Director of the Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment(SAGE) at the University of Wisconsin, where he is also the GaylordNelson Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies andAtmospheric & Oceanic Sciences.

F a c u l t y a n d A l u m n i N e w s

Arthur Guez, left, presents to professors Bruce Shepherd and Gonzalo Cosa at the ThirdAnnual Science Undergraduate Research Conference

Garry Peterson, Canada Research Chair and assistant professor cross-appointed

between the Department of Geography and the McGill School of the Environment,

gives a brief yet fascinating talk at the annual Dean’s Breakfast at McGill’s Faculty

Club during Homecoming celebrations this past October. More than 100 alumni,

donors and friends turned up for a hearty breakfast followed by a series of talks by

select faculty members.

Hundreds of students filled the lecture room at the Redpath Museum over the lunch hour

for a week this past September to hear 26 professors give short presentations on their

particular fields of research, after which students and faculty mingled over free lunch.This

increasingly popular event, Soup and Science, offers students a chance to find out about hot

new research, and to get involved in it as well. In the photo above, Professor Jason Young

from the Department of Biochemistry discusses his research with an undergraduate.

Research Conference Showcases Undergrads

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F o o d f o r T h o u g h t …

AT THE DEAN’S BREAKFAST

AT SOUP AND SCIENCE








Rudolph Arthur Marcus devised a theory that

explains such phenomena as photosynthesis,

electrically conducting polymers, and corrosion—

as well as many other chemical reactions. In 1992

he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Psychology Professor Ronald Melzack changed the

face of pain forever, first with his Gate Control

Theory and later the McGill Pain Questionnaire,

which remains a widely used clinical tool to evaluate

pain in patients around the world.








Earlier this year, Forbes named McGill psychology professor KarimNader one of “10 People Who Could Change the World” for hisgroundbreaking research on memory reconsolidation. Now, the

40-year-old Alfred P. Sloan Fellow and William Dawson Chair is poisedto deliver on that promise, saying that other psychopathological disorders,such epilepsy, obsessive-compulsive disorders or even addiction, can bealleviated through his revolutionary treatment.

“This is not just about memory—it’s abreakthrough in how the brain wires andrewires itself,” said Nader.

The experiments that won Naderinternational renown suggest that dam-aging memories can be stripped of theirpotency by administering a commonblood pressure drug, propranolol, as atraumatic event is being recollected.Thetreatment, which has proven effective inpost-traumatic stress disorder sufferers,does not erase memories, but simplyremoves the emotional baggage associat-ed with the memory.

“I’ve been working with manipulatingmemories to beneficial effect—but it has a more beneficial effect than Ihad originally thought,” Nader explained.“You know, the wiring in ourbrain undergoes changes in drug cravings, and that’s the same kind ofwiring that works in memory reconsolidation.Among the things we’relooking at now is blocking drug cravings in cocaine users, for example.

We have shown that, if you block these memories in animals that havetaken drugs hundreds of times, then you can stop the cravings for drugs.And in the history of the field, there’s been no other demonstration oftreatment causing long-term change, or cessation of drug-taking.Andthat’s just amazing, right?”

When Nader returns to his lab from sabbatical next year he willbegin a five-year research program that he

believes will show that his revolutionarymemory reconsolidation treatment hasbeneficial results not only in addicts ofall kinds, but on those afflicted by obses-sive-compulsive disorders, or experienc-ing chronic pain, epilepsy or majordepression.

The Cairo-born psychologist isworking hard to ensure that his researchadvances to the next level, and is tour-

ing the world to discuss his work, includ-ing a recent conference at the ColdSpring Harbor Lab’s prestigious BanburyCenter. He is also working with fellow

McGill psychology professor Jeffrey Mogil onapplying his research to chronic pain sufferers.

“I want to push this up another level,” says Nader.“All this stuffworks on animals.The drug stuff works.The pain stuff works.Therehas been a reasonable amount of research done on this, so we want totake from there.”

Psychology professor Karim Nader says his memory reconsolidation discoveries

can be used to treat drug addiction, chronic pain, and more

S c i e n t i s t T a k e s M e m o r y R e s e a r c h t o N e w H e i g h t s

N e w L a b W O W s ’ E m

The Imperial Oil Foundation is helping put the wow back into elementary and highschool education with its $800,000 gift that will fund McGill’s Winners of Wonderment(WOW) Lab, designed to assist teachers in generating excitement and enhanced learningin mathematics and sciences.

The Imperial Oil investment will help equip the WOW Lab with audiovisual, computerand other equipment.A joint project of McGill’s faculties of Science and Education, the lab isled by Dr. Brian Alters,Tomlinson Chair in Science Education and William Dawson Scholar.

“McGill’s top-flight faculty has a well-deserved reputation for thinking outside the box,and the WOW Lab is a testament to that spirit of innovation and inter-faculty cooperation,”said Principal and Vice-Chancellor Heather Munroe-Blum.

At its unveiling this past September, lab members showcased their ability to illuminateeven the most difficult science concepts to a group of Montreal high school students thatincluded a live display of buoyancy involving a McGill professor submerged in over 400 gallons of water—and later in the WOW Lab—a demonstration of superconductivity, with a levitating train.

Nuclear chemist Leo Yaffe pioneered research into

the peaceful application of nuclear technology,

developing practical applications of nuclear

radiation, including intense sources of cobalt-60

for the treatment of cancer, and radioactive tracers

for medical diagnosis and research.

McGill alumnus Bernard Belleau carried out fundamental

research on the chemistry of several groups of drugs

effective in combating infections and cancer. His highly

creative work in the 1980s led to the discovery of 3TC, the

first anti-HIV compound drug. 3TC remains a cornerstone

of combination HIV/AIDS infection therapies.

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Karim Nader, seated, surrounded by members of the Nader Lab atthe Department of Psychology

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Professor Brian Alters, cross-appointed in the faculties ofScience and Education, is known for his ability to illuminatescience’s most difficult concepts

Team Science Dec 2007

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Transcript of Team Science Dec 2007