CFI grants support UVic research observatories
UVic Earth and Ocean Sciences professor Jody Klymak and West Coast Wave Initiative Director Brad Buckham, a UVic mechanical engineer, were awarded $3.8 million toward a $9.5 million project to build a robotic ocean-observing platform in BC coastal waters as part of the Canada Foundation for Innovation announcement. The platform will one day provide invaluable data on weather, climate change, fish populations and clean-energy solutions such as wave energy through a better understanding of the dramatic changes occurring in the Northeast Pacific Ocean.
The world’s oceans are becoming warmer, more acidic and are losing oxygen. Those factors drive unexpected changes in ocean currents, weather and marine eco-systems, says Klymak, who will work with scientists at Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the University of BC on the project.
The Canadian Pacific Robotic Ocean Observing Platform (C-PROOF) aims to produce the data to quantify and predict these ocean changes. It also plays a vital role in the growth of BC’s marine-energy technology sector through wind and wave moorings capable of exacting and continuous measurement of wave energy.
UVic Faculty of Science researchers are also collaborators in three more CFI-funded projects led by other universities:
- New national facility for seismic imaging of critically important structures in the Earth. Led by Dalhousie University; UVic project leader Stan Dosso, Earth and Ocean Sciences. CFI grant: $5.6 million.
- Upgrades to the ATLAS Detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), one of two detectors that record data from proton-proton collisions at the LHC. Led by the University of Toronto; UVic project leader Richard Keeler, Physics and Astronomy. CFI grant: $30 million.
- Creation of a scientific instrument for Gemini Observatory providing follow-up for the James Webb Space Telescope when it launches in 2018, and supporting second-generation instruments for the Thirty Meter Telescope when it launches in 2024. Led by the University of Toronto; UVic project leader Kim Venn, Physics and Astronomy. CFI grant: $5 million.