One of the world’s leading experts on the dynamic and thermodynamic processes at work in snow-covered sea ice, Dr. David Barber, Canada Research Chair in Arctic System Science and Director of the Centre for Earth Observation Science in the Clayton H. Riddell Faculty of Environment, Earth, and Resources has played a pivotal role in International Polar Year research and discovering that sea-ice is disappearing at a much faster rate than previously known.

With the addition of the new Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) in Arctic Geomicrobiology and Climate Change Dr. Søren Rysgaard, the ‘dream team’ headed by Rysgaard and Barber has been created. Rysgaard is an internationally renowned geomicrobiologist from the Greenland Climate Research Centre. The new CERC team will work together uncovering the mysteries of climate change hidden deep within the Arctic ice. It will expand the existing team to more than 100 researchers and graduate students, who will have the unprecedented ability to study and learn collaboratively both here at the University of Manitoba and at the Greenland Climate Research Centre.

The CERC team will collaborate and study together in new state-of-the-art research facilities on the University of Manitoba campus. Currently under construction, the Nellie Cornoyea Arctic Research Facility will be home to specialized labs and classrooms. The Sea-Ice Environmental Research Facility – the first experimental sea ice facility in Canada – will allow for the fabrication and growth of sea ice under controlled conditions. It will provide researchers with increased understanding of how sea ice lives and breathes and how it is directly linked to the phenomenon of climate change. Already a world leader in the study of Arctic climate change, the University of Manitoba is poised to further its reputation as one of the world’s premier institutes focused on understanding climate change and its impact on the environment, people and animals.

How do we govern resources that belong to all, such as fish, wildlife, forests and protected areas? How do we balance the interests of individuals and society, in the short-term or over the long-term? Distinguished Professor Fikret Berkes, Canada Research Chair in Community-Based Resource Management, along with colleagues at the Natural Resources Institute, has been researching how the use of environment and resources can meet the needs of the present without compromising future generations.

University of Manitoba researchers, physicians, and oral health specialists are finding ways to improve medical and dental services delivery in the North and better understand the unique health challenges faced by its residents. Our researchers were the first to recognize youths with Type 2 diabetes mellitus.

The J.A. Hildes Northern Medical Unit has been providing much needed medical services to remote northern communities in Manitoba and the former Northwest Territories (now Nunavut) for more than 40 years. Working with local, provincial and federal government agencies, their mission is to provide community-based medical services, education and research. The Centre for Community Oral Health in the Faculty of Dentistry provides dental services to nine northern communities in Saskatchewan, Arctic Bay, Resolute Bay and Grise Fiord on Baffin Island.