Welcome to York University! A message from President Rhonda L. Lenton

York U president Rhonda Lenton
Dr. Lenton poses for a selfie with a group of York U students

The following is a welcome message to the University community from York President and Vice-Chancellor Rhonda L. Lenton:

Rhonda Lenton
York President and Vice-Chancellor Rhonda L. Lenton

I am delighted to welcome you all to a new academic year at York University!

Whether you are joining the University for the first time or are a returning student, staff or faculty member, I encourage you to think big, to be bold, and to embrace York’s unique identity as one of the most diverse and comprehensive universities in the world.

Today, we are recognized for our impact and excellence in research, transdisciplinary studies and sustainability, and we are also known internationally for our progressiveness, our commitment to social justice, accessibility and inclusivity. We are proud to be innovators, inside and outside of the classroom.

In your own role at York, you are uniquely positioned to uphold York’s defining values. In your class discussions, in the research you conduct, in your work and in the ways that you engage with your colleagues, I encourage you to embrace diverse perspectives, welcome challenging ideas and inspire open dialogue within our community.

Globalization and technology has had a significant impact on higher education and the ways in which students access knowledge. York is committed to ensuring that the student learning experience continues to evolve with these changes through the advancement of technology-enhanced learning, experiential education, internationalization and other pedagogical innovation that inspires self-directed learning.

We are equally committed to ensuring that all community members feel welcome on campus, and this includes feeling safe to engage in dialogue and share views which may not be popular or which may differ from those of others.

York is a university with purpose, and a university seeking to make a positive societal impact locally, regionally and globally. As I begin my first year as York’s President and Vice-Chancellor, I look forward to supporting you in the many different ways that you will make your own impact here.

I invite you to take a look at my welcome video to learn more about me and my vision for York University. You can also keep in touch with me on social media at @YorkUPresident, or by email at president@yorku.ca.

I wish you the very best this year, and I look forward to seeing you on campus.

Canadian Writers in Person series features CanLit talent

Canadian Writers in Person Series 2017-18 PosterThis fall will be a real page turner for those interested in CanLit. On select Tuesday evenings throughout the 2017-18 academic year, York University’s celebrated Canadian Writers in Person series presents 11 established and new writers delivering readings from their published work.

“We have a terrific lineup of authors for 2017-18,” says Professor Gail Vanstone, coordinator of the Culture & Expression Program in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies. Vanstone noted that since compiling the list, one of this year’s featured writers, Jordan Abel, won the Griffin Poetry prize.

The iconic Canadian Writers in Person series poster, designed exclusively for Canadian Writers in Person was created by Erik Morin, a Vancouver-based graphic artist. “Erik Morin is the graphic artist behind the brilliant series of pencil posters, the pencil reminds us of the human creative endeavour of writing,” notes Vanstone. “Erik designed the first poster for the 2005-06, featuring a pencil emerging from a beaver’s den and has been designing them ever since.”

All readings are free and open to the public and take place on select Tuesdays, from 7 to 10pm in 206 Accolade West Building.

Sept. 19
Mona Awad: Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl

Mona Awad
Mona Awad

Awad was born in Montreal, QC and has lived in the United States on and off since 2003. An alumna of York University, Awad received her MFA in Fiction from Brown University and her MScR in English literature from the University of Edinburgh. Her writing has appeared in McSweeney’s, The Walrus, JoylandPost RoadSt. Petersburg Review, and elsewhere. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Creative Writing and English literature at the University of Denver. Her first novel Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl was shortlisted for the prestigious Giller Prize.

Oct. 3
Anosh Irani: The Parcel

Anosh Irani
Anosh Irani

Irani has published three critically acclaimed novels: The Cripple and His Talismans, a national bestseller; The Song of Kahunsha, an international bestseller, shortlisted for Canada Reads and the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize; and Dahanu Road, nominated for the Man Asian Literary Prize. His play Bombay Black won the Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding New Play, and his anthology The Bombay Plays: The Matka King & Bombay Black was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award. His work has been translated into eleven languages. His new novel The Parcel is published by Knopf and was a finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the Governor General’s Literary Award.

Oct. 17
Phoebe Wang: Admission Requirements

Phoebe Wang
Phoebe Wang

Wang’s poetry has appeared in Arc PoetryCanadian Literature, CV2, DescantGrainMalahat ReviewRicepaper Magazine, THIS Magazine and Diaspora Dialogues’ TOK 6: Writing the New Toronto anthology. She won the 2015 Prism International Poetry; her first chapbook, Occasional Emergencies, was published with Toronto’s Odourless Press in 2013 and her second, Hanging Exhibits, with The Emergency Response Unit in 2016. Admission Requirements, her debut collection of poetry, is forthcoming from McClelland and Stewart in spring 2017.

Oct. 31
Trevor Cole: Hope Makes Love

Trevor Cole
Trevor Cole

Cole is an award-winning journalist and novelist. As a journalist, he has won nine National Magazine awards and still writes for magazines such as Report on Business Magazine, Macleans and Toronto Life. In the fall of 2000, he began writing fiction.  His first two books — Norman Bray in the Performance of His Life and The Fearsome Particles — were both short-listed for the Governor General’s Literary Award and long-listed for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Norman Bray was also short-listed for the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for Best First Book in the Canada-Caribbean region. Cole’s third novel, Practical Jean, was nominated for the Rogers’ Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and won the famous Leacock Medal for Humour. His latest novel is Hope Makes Love, was named a 49th Shelf Book of the Year for 2015.

Nov. 14
Gary Barwin: Yiddish for Pirates

Gary Barwin
Gary Barwin

Barwin is a writer, composer, multimedia artist and the author of 20 books of poetry, fiction and books for children.  His recent books include Yiddish for Pirates (Random House Canada), which was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and nominated for the Governor General’s Literary Award, the short fiction collection, I, Dr. Greenblatt, Orthodontist, 251-1457, and the poetry collection Moon Baboon Canoe.  In 2017, No TV for Woodpeckers, a new poetry collection, will appear from Wolsak and Wynn. He has a PhD in music composition and was a Writer-in-Residence at Western University and a Young Voices E-Writer-in-Residence at the Toronto Public Library. Barwin has taught creative writing at a number of colleges and universities.

Nov. 28
Kerry Lee Powell: Willem de Kooning’s Paintbrush

Kerry Lee Powell
Kerry Lee Powell

Powell’s work has appeared in The Spectator, the Boston Review, the Virago Press Writing Women series and Best Canadian Stories. In 2013, she won the Malahat Review’s Far Horizons Award and the Boston Review’s Aura Estrada Short Story Award. Her debut poetry collection was published by Biblioasis Press in 2014 and was nominated for the Gerald Lampert award and the Alfred Bailey manuscript prize. Her short fiction collection, Willem de Kooning’s Paintbrush, was published by HarperCollins in 2016. It was nominated for the 2016 Scotiabank Giller Prize and was shortlisted for the 2016 Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. She is the series editor of Grey Suit, a London-based contemporary visual arts archive and press funded by The Elephant Trust and the Arts Council of England.

Jan. 16, 2018
Paul Yee: A Superior Man

Paul Yee
Paul Yee

Yee is the author of many books for children, including Teach Me to Fly, Skyfighter, The Curses of Third Uncle, Dead Man’s Gold and Ghost Train — winner of the 1996 Governor General’s Award for English language children’s literature.  In 2012, the Writers’ Trust of Canada awarded Paul Yee the Vicky Metcalf Award for Literature for Young People in recognition of having “contributed uniquely and powerfully to our literary landscape over a writing career that spans almost 30 years” and most of his many publications have received individual awards.  A Superior Man, his latest work, and a novel for adults, details 19th-century Chinese Canadian history.

Jan. 30
Soraya Peerbaye: Tell

Soraya Peerbaye
Soraya Peerbaye

Peerbaye’s first collection of poetry, Poems for the Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names, was nominated for the Gerald Lampert Award. Her poems have appeared in Red Silk: An Anthology of South Asian Women Poets (2004), edited by Priscila Uppal and Rishma Dunlop, as well as the literary journals Other Voices, Prairie Fire and The New Quarterly; she has also contributed to the chapbook anthology Translating Horses. In 2016, Tell was shortlisted for the prestigious Griffin Poetry Prize. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Guelph.

Feb. 13
Jordan Abel: Injun

Jordan Abel
Jordan Abel

Abel is a Nisga’a writer from British Columbia. Currently, he is pursuing a PhD at Simon Fraser University where his research concentrates on the intersection between Digital Humanities and Indigenous Literary Studies. Abel’s creative work has recently been anthologized in Best Canadian Poetry (Tightrope), The Land We Are: Artists and Writers Unsettle the Politics of Reconciliation (Arbiter Ring), and The New Concrete: Visual Poetry in the 21st Century (Hayword). Abel is the author of Injun, Un/inhabited and The Place of Scraps (winner of the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize and finalist for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award).

March 6
Katherena Vermette: The Break

Katherena Vermette

Vermette is a Métis writer from Treaty One territory, the heart of the Métis nation, Winnipeg, Man. Her first book, North End Love Songs (The Muses’ Company) won the Governor General’s Literary Award for Poetry. Her National Film Board short documentary, this river, won the Coup de Coeur at the Montreal First Peoples Festival and won the 2017 Canadian Screen Award for Best Short. Her first novel, The Break (House of Anansi) was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, the Rogers Trust Fiction Prize and was a finalist for Canada Reads 2016.

March 13
Garfield Ellis: The Angel’s Share

Garfield Ellis
Garfield Ellis

Ellis grew up in Jamaica where he studied marine engineering, management and public relations and then completed his Master of Fine Arts degree at the University of Miami. He is a two-time winner of the Una Marson prize for adult literature; in the first instance for his first collection of short stories, Flaming Hearts (pub. 1997), and later for the novel, Till I’m Laid To Rest. He has twice won the Canute A. Brodhurst prize for fiction (The Caribbean Writer, University of Virgin Islands) 2000 and 2005 and the 1990 Heinemann/Lifestyle short story competition. He is the author of six novels and his work has appeared in several international journals, including; Callaloo, Calabash, the Caribbean writer, Obsidian III, Anthurium and Small Axe.

Readings are part of Culture & Expression’s AP/CLTR 1953 6.0, a degree credit course on Canadian literary culture. More information at: http://www.yorku.ca/laps/canwrite/ or call 416-736-5158, or 416-736-2100 ext. 33957 or email: leslie@yorku.ca or gailv@yorku.ca.

York U creates and uses new online inclusion tool for Orientation Week

inclusion lens FEATURED
inclusion lens FEATURED

Student leaders at York University are using a new online tool – an Inclusion Lens – to proactively ensure its close to 500 orientation week events are welcoming to incoming members of the York community.

The Inclusion Lens may be the first online event management tool created by a Canadian university to provide students with both a comprehensive how-to guide along with a checklist to track progress towards inclusive events on campus. The Lassonde School of Engineering and York’s Centre for Human Rights, Equity and Inclusion worked together to develop the tool.

Rhonda Lenton

“Inclusion is a core value of York University,” said Rhonda Lenton, York University’s president and vice-chancellor. “We are committed to proactively celebrating our differences and reflecting the value of inclusion in the ways we teach, govern ourselves, interact as a community, and research solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges. Since its earliest days, York University has been dedicated to social justice. The Inclusion Lens is an important new tool to help us continue this legacy of leadership and innovation, ensuring a truly welcoming and inclusive campus environment for all.”

The Inclusion Lens drew from the Ontario Public Service Inclusion Lens to help students see their events from a perspective other than their own. Added were an event planning guide, easy-to-find university resources and a checklist to track progress.

Marisa Sterling

“The Inclusion Lens is about going beyond policy compliance to leading by example,” said Marisa Sterling, assistant dean, Inclusivity and Diversity, Lassonde School of Engineering. “When students want to create an event, they easily click through the planning, advertising, implementing and evaluating tabs on the website. At each stage, they receive guidance, education and a link to university resources.”

Inclusive considerations include advertising broadly to reach more diverse communities, accommodating for sliding scale ticket prices for affordability and arranging for prayer services throughout the day of the event.

The Lassonde School of Engineering is tackling a longstanding gap in the field of engineering, where in 2015 only 20 per cent of undergraduate students across Canada were women. After launching its Inclusivity Project in 2016, the school realized the desire for inclusion existed, but the community needed the tools and education on how to get there. After training more than 90 Lassonde students as inclusivity ambassadors, the school started work on providing its students practical steps to weave inclusion throughout all of their campus experiences.

“In 2015, we were the first engineering school in Canada to launch our 50:50 Challenge for gender parity,” said Sterling. “Our goal is not simply to have diversity but to do something with that diversity by innovating and leading. I am very proud of our students who continue to embrace this positive culture change each year.”

Acknowledging that inclusion and accessibility are key values of the University’s Academic Plan 2015-2020 and the administration’s Strategic Priorities, the newly re-named Centre for Human Rights, Equity and Inclusion is implementing an enhanced mission to give institution-wide form and content to those values and assist York in proactively cultivating difference.

“The Centre for Human Rights, Equity and Inclusion (REI) is very pleased to have been instrumental in the development of York University’s Inclusion Lens,” said Executive Director Michael Charles. “The tool will serve as an additional means to embed the values of access, equity and inclusion into the activities and campus life of our students.”

The Inclusion Lens can be used by anyone at York and beyond, but the team focused their work on student leaders who plan and run events, recognizing that they are the next generation of leaders.

The lens is being used this fall by all colleges and faculties of York University to plan, advertise, implement and evaluate orientation week events that run until Sept. 10 and welcome close to 7,600 new students to the campus.

More than 1,200 student orientation leaders have also been trained in inclusive and positive language and have signed an Orientation Leader Contract to ensure they both create an inclusive experience and show respect for a student’s right to choose the activities they wish to participate in.

Watch a video below:

New Fellow appointed for Helen Carswell Chair in Community Engaged Research in the Arts

Before an audience of passionate educators, and celebrated with three stellar music performances, York University Professor Karen Burke was announced as the inaugural Fellow for the Helen Carswell Chair in Community Engaged Research in the Arts. The event took place on Thursday, Aug. 24 at York University’s Keele campus.

A group of people stand and smile at the camera
Above: From left, Karen Cyrus, Norma-Sue Fisher-Stitt, Ruth Carswell, Alan Carswell, Karen Burke, Richard Marsella, Jane O’Hare, Kristin Morrison and Bill Thomas

The Carswell Chair is a permanent endowed position within the School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design (AMPD) at York University.

As Fellow, Burke will facilitate and direct the research partnership in collaboration with a multi-disciplinary Advisory Working Group. The Chair and committee will encourage research projects from across the University that inform curriculum and programming at RPSM, while also making unique contributions to the peer-reviewed academic literature exploring the impact of music programs. Following her initial two-year appointment, future Chairs will be named for terms of three to five years.

Karen Burke
Karen Burke speaks to those gathered for the announcement

A renowned singer, choral director and composer, Burke is recognized as an authority on the history and performance practices of gospel music. She started the first curricular post-secondary gospel music courses in Canada including the 100-voice York University Gospel Choir. Her Juno-award winning Toronto Mass Choir has been touring and recording in Canada since 1988.

“Karen has already been hard at work over the last year, leading and collaborating with the members of the advisory group and working with RPSM to build its presence in the Jane and Finch community, said Norma Sue Fisher-Stitt, AMPD interim dean of the School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design. “Over the next four years RPSM will continue to expand in the Jane-Finch area, providing access to music lessons and a wide range of performance opportunities, opening new avenues through which children can express themselves and develop their talents.”

a young man plays the piano
Thomas Francis

“Karen has a super human ability to electrify and bring a room to life,” said RPSM Executive Director Richard Marsella. “Our collaboration grows each and every week. We are reaching 250 local kids aged 3-18 and we will remain with them on their path, walking them right up the steps to York University or the post secondary education of their choice.”

The endowed Chair and related research activities are made possible through an exceptionally generous $2 million gift from the Carswell Family Foundation (CFF). York professor emeritus Allan Carswell announced the donation at an event held at York University on November 16, 2016 (read more about the announcement in YFile, Nov 17, 2016).

Charlotte Seigel

The gift also makes funds available for York graduate research projects that will ultimately inform best practices in community arts programs, and explore the benefits of community music programs and the links between music and learning. A call for research proposals will be released this fall and updates will be shared on ampd.yorku.ca/research/opportunities/.

“For me this work is all about putting students first and the celebration of music in our lives,” said Burke. “Thank you Dr. Carswell and the Carswell Family Foundation for your generous gift that multiplies the impact of your vision in this community.

“York University is strategically located within a community that is rich with history, alive with culture and committed to expression through the arts,” said Burke. “Undoubtedly, we have yet to fully realize the full strength of this potential. The Carswell family, through their generous endowment, have provided an enduring pathway which will yield strong community music-making ties, encourage young people to realize their dreams of success and strengthen and expand York’s footprint in community arts.”

Jenna Cowans

Accompanying the heartfelt speeches were three inspiring musical performances by jazz pianist and York MFA candidate Thomas Francis (BFA ’12), RPSM alumna Charlotte Seigel and Jenna Cowans (BFA ’09).

The event was part of the Faculty of Education Summer Institute 2017.

 

Harold I. Schiff Lecture to focus on the impact of melting sea ice in Canadian Arctic

Research aircraft in flight over the Arctic

Professor Jon Abbatt in the Department of Chemistry, University of Toronto, will deliver the 26th annual Harold I. Schiff Lecture on Wednesday, Sept. 13. Abbatt’s lecture, “Aerosol in the Arctic Summertime: Sources, Impacts and Melting Sea Ice,” will take place at 2:30pm in 320 Norman Bethune College, York University.

Jon Abbatt

As part of a large Natural Sciences & Engineering Research Council of Canada-funded network project, NETCARE, field measurements were made in the Arctic in the summer of 2014 to investigate the nature of aerosol in the high Canadian Arctic.

The goal of this research was to study the fundamental processes that control the size, abundance and composition of Arctic aerosol particles in light of a rapidly changing Arctic environment. The study examined whether melting sea ice affects Arctic aerosol and clouds.

To address this question, measurements were made from both the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) POLAR6 aircraft and the CGCS Amundsen Icebreaker. A consistent story arose wherein a biologically active ocean provides a source of volatile gases to the atmosphere that are oxidized to promote both new particle formation and growth in this cool, pristine environment.

Under specific conditions, the numbers of cloud condensation nuclei increase with ensuing effects on cloud droplets. The summer environment will be contrasted against the much better understood character of the aerosol in the Arctic springtime, i.e. during the period of Arctic Haze. In particular, NETCARE also made measurements in the spring of 2015, adding to our understanding of the importance of long-range transport and different depositional processes in controlling aerosol abundance during this time period.

The work to be presented reflects the combined efforts of a great number of NETCARE personnel and collaborators. Especially important were scientific, financial and logistical contributions from Environment & Climate Change Canada, the Department of Fisheries & Oceans, AWI and a number of foreign collaborators

The Annual Harold I. Schiff Lecture is organized by the Centre for Atmospheric Chemistry at York. For more information, email cac@yorku.ca.

More about the Harold I. Schiff Lecture series

Harold I. Schiff

The Harold I. Schiff Lecture series was established in honour of late Professor Emeritus Harold I. Schiff (1923-2003), who was York’s founding dean of the Faculty of Science in 1968. Among his numerous achievements are his major contributions to the development of techniques for measuring trace constituents in the upper atmosphere and to the interpretation of the physics and chemistry of the stratosphere.

An educator and scientist in the field of chemistry, Schiff began at York in 1964, and was named a member of York’s Founders Society in honour of his contributions to the early development of the University. While at York, Schiff was chair of the Department of Chemistry and director of the Natural Science program in 1964, dean of the Faculty of Science from 1965-72 and director of the Centre for Atmospheric Chemistry from 1985-89.

Welcome! York U hosts orientation for new students

students wave red towels at a gathering at the 2015 York U orientation welcome event

Beginning Sept. 2 and running until Sept. 10, first-year students will have a myriad of wonderful opportunities to learn about and participate in university life at York U.

New students are led by their orientation leaders in a cheer spirit competition during last year’s social orientation

Orientation Week features an array of social and academic orientation events designed to engage students beginning their university careers. Activities take place at both the Keele and Glendon campuses, and will help first-year students get acquainted with the places and faces of York U.

“Orientation serves to complement our robust transition programming that took place during the summer. We work with more than 60 campus partners and train over 1,200 orientation leaders to help welcome our incoming class to help ensure their start is a successful one” said Ross McMillan, director of Student Engagement & First Year Experience for Student Community & Leadership Development.

It all begins Sept. 2, when first-year students staying in residence will move in to their dorm rooms and participate, with their parents, in orientation activities for residence life.

On Sept. 6, thousands of first year students from Glendon, Keele and those who commute to campus, will attend York Orientation Day, when they will have the opportunity to meet other students, as well as their peer mentors and professors. Students will have an opportunity to explore the campus and attend the annual Welcome Ceremony.

Students from a number of colleges enjoy a meet and greet event

Other events are organized by the college councils of Bethune, Calumet, Founders, Glendon, McLaughlin, New, Stong, Vanier and Winters, as well as Lassonde and Schulich. The week offers first-year students an opportunity to participate in pan-university activities, in addition to events specific to each college.

Some of the events include special breakfasts, academic workshops, carnivals, trips to Wasaga Beach and Canada’s Wonderland, the Lions YU game and a boat cruise.

Events and activities are led by trained orientation leaders who work hard during the week to instill a sense of pride and excitement in those new to the Keele and Glendon campuses.

Orientation events are dry, meaning there is no alcohol, with an emphasis on safe and inclusive fun. There is a special emphasis on consent education with activities and education developed in partnership with the Sexual Violence Response Office. Both residents (who kick off the week on Sept. 2 with move-in day) and commuters are invited to participate in Orientation Week activities, and commuter students can make arrangements to stay on campus for the week in specially designated commuter rooms.

For more on orientation events, visit orientation.yorku.ca and follow the hastags #weareyu and #WelcomeYU.

York, U of T, OCAD U, Ryerson students and faculty take on affordable housing in massive joint research project

The presidents of Toronto’s four universities – York University, the University of Toronto, OCAD University and Ryerson University – have teamed up for a new initiative called StudentDwellTO to tackle one of the biggest issues facing postsecondary students in the Greater Toronto Area: affordable housing.

The initiative brings together nearly 100 faculty and students from the four universities to take an in-depth look at student housing in the GTA.

This follows a previous collaboration between the four universities: a massive survey of student travel behaviour, called StudentMoveTO, which revealed that long daily commutes for students – many of whom live far away where housing is more affordable – were leading to lower campus engagement and in some cases limiting students’ class choices.

StudentMoveTO and StudentDwellTO are parts of an initiative by the presidents of the four universities aimed at improving the state of the city-region – and, in turn, the experiences for university students in the GTA.

“The GTA’s housing affordability crisis has attracted a lot of attention, but we know very little about how postsecondary students are coping in the current housing climate,” says York faculty member Luisa Sotomayor, co-principal Investigator of the StudentDwellTO project. “More than 180,000 students attend the four universities in Toronto, but the distinct barriers they face get diluted in the larger affordability picture.”

The intention of the StudentDwellTO project is to identify creative initiatives and potential partnerships to keep housing adequate and accessible for Toronto’s increasingly diverse postsecondary student population, she said.

StudentDwellTO will look at housing affordability from a range of perspectives, bringing together disciplines, including architecture, art, education, engineering, environmental studies and design, geography, psychology, real estate management, and urban development and planning.

The two-year initiative will have heavy research and advocacy components, and the researchers will collect data using a variety of research methods that include:

  • wide-scale focus groups and accompanying surveys to draw out narratives surrounding students’ lived experiences;
  • interactive website and community arts programming and communication tools; and
  • interactive maps to develop affordable housing strategies.

The subject matter will also be incorporated into experiential learning courses, across all four universities and various disciplines, to propose and test solutions to the student housing experience and crisis.

York professors awarded $2.7M in health research funding

Research York University
Research York University

Three York University researchers awarded a combined $2,723,399 in funding from the Canadian Institute for Health Research (CIHR) will work to advance health-related investigations in areas of social/cultural health and biomedical health.

Professors Peter Backx, Yvonne Bohr and Chun Peng each received a CIHR Project Grant, which is designed to capture ideas with the greatest potential in health research, health care, health systems, and/or health outcomes.

Backx, in York’s Faculty of Science, Department of Biology, will receive $749,700 for a five-year project studying circulatory and respiratory health. His project, “Uncovering the mechanisms of atrial fibrillation using lessons from the adverse atrial remodeling induced by intense exercise” explores relationships between heart health and age, heart disease and exercise.

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common cardiac arrhythmia whose incidence is increased with age, heart disease, and exercise. Backx has compelling evidence that the mechanisms driving AF in exercise is similar to that seen in AF due to heart disease and also that rising with age. The studies will identify the molecular and cellular mechanisms leading broadly to AF thereby allowing the identification of novel approaches for treating and preventing AF.

Bohr, in the Faculty of Health, will receive $1,258,424 over four years for her project “Making I-SPARX fly in Nunavut“, which investigates the use of an award-winning computer program in a cognitive behavioural (CBT) intervention designed to support Inuit adolescents. The project strives to enhance resiliency and increase mattering by empowering youth who are at risk for depression. It evaluates a holistic, multi-generational intervention that brings together CBT, emotion regulation support, culture identity and community processes. Youth leaders, guided by community Elders, will develop skills to foster their own mental health, and also contribute to the collective welfare of their communities. Nunavut-based software developers will support youth in the design of an Inuit-specific version of the SPARX video game intervention, which was shown to be a promising tool in a pilot study completed in 2016 by Bohr and her colleagues.

This initiative aims to integrate the six integral principles of Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit and serve six Inuit communities. Youth will take on activities that engage their communities in the dissemination and practice of I-SPARX teachings. It is hoped that, once adapted to Inuit culture, and with Nunavut youth making the program their own, I-SPARX may become a useful tool for both Nunavut youth at-risk for depression, and for those working with them.

As part of the project, Inuit youth leaders will be invited to take part in a youth leadership camp at York University during the second year of this project.

“Nunavut has one of the highest adolescent suicide rates in the world and clearly Inuit youth in Northern Canada face extreme adversities,” said Bohr. “Yet, little research has been conducted with Inuit adolescents who are at risk for depression, and remote Nunavut communities have scarce resources for early prevention and intervention programs. There is an urgent need for accessible, culturally relevant and community-supported intervention tools.

“We are fortunate to be teaming up with four Nunavut-based organizations for the implementation of this project: the Nunavut Research Institute, the Qaujigiartiit Health Research Centre, Isaksimagit Inuusirmi Katujjiqaatigiit Embrace Life Council, and Pinnguaq Association, a Nunavut-based not for profit technology startup. The project will benefit from the expertise of a multi-disciplinary, national/international research team with team members from Canada, Nunavut, the U.S., Israel and New Zealand”.

Collaborators include York’s Debra Pepler, Gordon Flett, Farah Ahmad, Sarah Flicker, Jennine Rawana, Jonathan Weiss, Jennifer Jenson, and Hugh McCague and psychology PhD student Leah Litwin. Many graduate and undergraduate assistants will also be involved.

Peng, in the Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, will receive $715,275 over five years to study “MicroRNA-218s and their regulated signaling networks in placental development and preeclampsia“.

Preeclampsia (PE) is a major disorder of human pregnancy, characterized by high blood pressure and presence of proteins in the urine. It is the leading cause of maternal death and still birth, and also affects the health of mothers and children later in their lives.

The cause of PE is not well understood; however, Peng’s research has discovered that microRNA-218 (niR-218) levels are lower in placentas of PE patients than those of healthy women, and that miR-218 regulates various activities in placental cells.

These novel findings suggest that miR-218 plays important roles in maintaining the proper development of the placenta and that insufficient production of miR-218 in the placenta contributes to the development of PE.

The major objectives of this grant are to further investigate the role of miR-218 in placenta development; to identify which key molecules are regulated by miR-218; and to determine how abnormal production of miR-218 may lead to PE.

Peng will use placental cells, placental organ culture and placenta/uterus co-culture systems, as well as endothelial cells, to study the functions of miR-218 and the key molecules regulated by miR-218. Findings from the proposed studies will improve the understanding of PE and may reveal novel diagnostic and therapeutic targets for this disorder.

York research finds fruit flies die in the cold due to leaky guts

Common fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. By Heath MacMillan, York University

Flies, like most insects, are poikilothermic ectotherms. This means that unlike us, their body temperature follows the temperature of the surrounding air. When it is warm, flies are happy; a cold fly is a sad fly, and we are beginning to understand why. New research conducted in the Faculty of Science at York University suggests that fruit flies can’t tolerate low temperature for an interesting reason: their guts get leaky.

Common fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster (image: Heath MacMillan, York University)

“Most fruit flies are chill susceptible,” said Heath MacMillan, who is now based at Carleton University, but led the study as a Banting Postdoctoral Fellow working with Professors Andrew Donini and Scott Kelly in the Department of Biology. “That means that unlike some insects that can survive or avoid freezing solid in the cold, they simply cannot take it, and instead die at relatively mild low temperatures.”

Graduate students Gil Yerushalmi, who is supervised by Donini, and Sima Jonusaite, who is co-supervised by Donini and Kelly, were also authors on the study, which was published in Nature Scientific Reports.

In the cold, insects struggle to keep salts and water from accumulating in their gut, and this loss of balance can trigger cell death. If these injuries are severe enough, the insect cannot survive. The researchers used fruit flies to examine whether this loss of balance was related to a problem regulating the barriers between cells in the gut. Indeed, exposure to a temperature of 0 C caused the guts of the flies to get leaky. However, exposing the flies to just a bit of chilling first led them to be more cold tolerant.

“If we first exposed the flies to 10 C to acclimate, their cold tolerance improved, and they were also better able to maintain the barriers in their gut tissues,” said Donini. “These changes were specifically associated with changes in proteins that we already know are structural components of these barriers.”

The researchers plan to use this information to examine specifically how these proteins are contributing to insect survival in the cold. The ultimate goal is to better understand how temperature sets critical limits to insect survival, which has implications for controlling insect pests in a period of climate change.

Lions open season against Mustangs on Sunday

The 2017 Ontario University Athletics (OUA) campaign officially gets underway on Sunday, Aug. 27, when the York University Lions football team hosts the Western Mustangs in the season opener for both teams.

Kickoff is set for 1pm at Alumni Field, and the game can also be seen live online on OUA.tv.

The Lions will get to test themselves against one of the best football teams in the country right away with the visit from the Mustangs, who reached the Yates Cup final in each of the past two years and most recently won the championship in 2013.

For the Lions, Sunday’s game is a chance to show the hometown fans how much they’ve grown this off-season. After a promising 2016 campaign, in which they picked up a pair of wins and had a chance to qualify for the playoffs on the final day of the regular season, the Lions had a tremendous off-season in recruiting and workouts, and are poised to continue making noise in the conference.

Both of their wins last year came on home turf and the offence put on a show, amassing more than 50 points in each contest as part of a pair of lopsided victories over Waterloo and Windsor.

The Mustangs, meanwhile, will be taking the field for the first time since their collapse in last year’s OUA final, where they led Laurier by 21 points in the fourth quarter but relinquished the lead late and then lost on the final play of the game. They have had all off-season to regroup and, under the direction of five-time OUA coach of the year Greg Marshall, will no doubt be ready to go at kickoff on Sunday.

On Sunday, York and Western will face off for the first time since 2015 and the Lions will be looking to finally get past a dominant Mustangs squad that has won all but one meeting between the two teams.

Tickets can be purchased online at yorkulions.ca/ticketing in advance, or at the gate on game day.