Today, the Royal Society of Canada (RSC) announced the induction of 89 new Fellows, nine of whom are McGill researchers and scholars. The new group of Fellows will be formally inducted into the RSC on November 24, in Winnipeg. Included among this cohort is Professor Maryam Tabrizian, who is the first member of McGill’s Faculty of Dentistry to become an RSC Fellow. The RSC consists of over 2,000 Fellows selected by their peers for outstanding contributions to the natural and social sciences, arts and humanities. The RSC works to advise governments and organizations while recognizing academic excellence in Canada.
“Over the course of the past 20 years, the Faculty of Dentistry has seen an extraordinary explosion in the quality and quantity of its research,” said Paul Allison, Dean of Dentistry. “Professor Tabrizian has contributed to this transformation by being an outstanding role model for us in promoting research and research training. Her election to the Royal Society of Canada is an extremely proud moment in the history of the Faculty of Dentistry, reflecting the excellence of both her and the Faculty’s research.”
This new group of Fellows boosts McGill’s total fellowship count to 174 inducted into the Society since 1966, including Honorary and Specially Elected Fellows. Established in 1882, the RSC is Canada’s national academy of distinguished scholars, artists and scientists. Fellowship is widely considered the highest honour bestowed upon a Canadian academic. This year’s inductees represent McGill’s excellence across the disciplines, with research interests ranging from child welfare in Canada to the study of the epidemiology and pathogenesis of mycobacterial diseases.
“We are immensely proud that nine of our most accomplished researchers have been honoured with a Fellowship of the Royal Society of Canada, a testament to the research-intensive culture at McGill,” said Prof. Martha Crago, Vice-Principal, Research and Innovation. “The RSC does invaluable work in promoting Canadian scholarship at home and abroad. McGill’s new Fellows will be excellent ambassadors for the Society and for the University.”
Among the new fellows is Nico Trocmé, Professor and Director of the School of Social Work, whose life’s work has focused on protecting the wellbeing of children in Canada. A renowned policy and program consultant to several provincial governments and Aboriginal organizations, Prof. Trocmé is the principal investigator for the Canadian Incidence Study (CIS) of Reported Child Abuse and Neglect and the lead researcher for a Federal-Provincial-Territorial initiative to develop a common set of National Outcomes Measures in child welfare.
Prof. Marcel Behr, the Director and Microbiologist-in-Chief of the McGill International TB Centre, concentrates on the application of bacterial genetics to study the epidemiology and pathogenesis of mycobacterial diseases, specifically, M. tuberculosis, the cause of TB and BCG, the vaccine used against TB. Numerous awards, including the Chercheur National of the Fonds de la Recherche en Sante du Quebec and Election to the American Society for Clinical Investigation, 2010, have recognized his work.
McGill’s 2017 Royal Society of Canada Fellows:
Marcel Behr Professor, Department of Medicine, and Director and Microbiologist-in-Chief of the McGill International TB Centre.
Vihang Errunza, Professor and Associate Dean, Research, Desautels Faculty of Management.
Edith Hamel, Professor, Department of Neurology & Neurosurgery, Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital.
Caroline Palmer, Professor, Department of Psychology; Canada Research Chair, Cognitive Neuroscience of Performance.
Jerry Pelletier, James McGill Professor, Departments of Biochemistry and Oncology.
Maryam Tabrizian, Professor, Faculty of Dentistry and Department of Biomedical Engineering, Faculty of Medicine.
Andrea Tone, Professor, Department of Social Studies of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, and Department of History and Classical Studies, Faculty of Arts. Canada Research Chair in the Social History of Medicine.
Nico Trocmé, Director and Professor, School of Social Work.
Robert Zatorre, Professor, Departments of Neurology and Neurosurgery, Psychology
Read the Royal Society of Canada announcement