Government of Canada awards $2.9 million to Laurier researchers through New Frontiers in Research Fund

June 3, 2024

Through its New Frontiers in Research Fund (NFRF), the Government of Canada is investing in innovative research projects led by Wilfrid Laurier University faculty members Jonathan Crush, Sarah Poynter and Nicolas Rouleau. NFRF funds high-risk, high-reward, interdisciplinary research led by Canadian researchers.

“The investments announced today help bring world-leading researchers together to work on innovative research projects that could have significant impacts,” says Honourable François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry. “By bringing disciplines together in unexpected ways, we are responding to the challenges Canada and the world are facing.” 

In the International Joint Initiative for Research in Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Competition, Crush, a professor in Laurier’s Department of Political Science and at the Balsillie School of International Affairs, was awarded $2.4 million for his project “Remitting for resilience: Enhancing food security and climate change adaptation through gender-inclusive migrant remittances.” Bringing together 12 universities in eight African countries, Crush and his collaborators, including Laurier colleagues Zhenzhong Si, Sujata Ramachandran and Maria Salamone, are assessing whether remittances from migrant diasporas in Canada, the UK and South Africa to female-headed African households can enhance their ability to adapt to the disruptive effects of climate change.

In the Exploration Competition, Poynter, an assistant professor of Health Sciences, was awarded $250,000 for her project “Developing plant biofactories for aquaculture RNA therapeutics.” Along with Laurier colleagues Christian Danve Castroverde and Stephanie DeWitte-Orr, Poynter plans to use a nucleic acid produced by plants as an antiviral treatment for fish.

Rouleau, also an assistant professor of Health Sciences, was awarded $233,750 in the Exploration Competition for his project “Building modular circuits with bioengineered neural tissues to design brain-inspired artificial intelligences.” He and his colleagues will use bioengineered brains to decipher what algorithms the human brain uses to solve problems, then apply those strategies to refine artificial intelligence decision-making.