TVB Associates was pleased to have a strategic role supporting McMaster University in a national proposal for a $47M project for infrastructure for neutron beams. This project, entitled “Building a Future for Canadian Neutron Scattering”, was supported by 17 universities across Canada. The Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) awarded its contribution to the project, $14.25M, in March 2021 through its 2020 Innovation Fund competition.
This $14.25M award was the largest in the 2020 competition.
Project initiation awaits decisions for matching contributions from provincial governments of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec.
Project Summary
“Building a Future for Canadian Neutron Scattering” is a national project that will enable research and innovation in areas such as materials for clean energy technology, materials for structural integrity of reliability-critical components of vehicles or nuclear power plants, biomaterials for understanding and combating disease, and materials for information technology.
Neutron beams are versatile and irreplaceable 21st century tools for studying materials and are needed by a Canadian research community that includes about 100 principal investigators from over 30 universities. Access to neutron beams is urgently needed following the recent closure of the Canadian Neutron Beam Centre and the expiry of Canada’s only agreement for access to a foreign neutron beam facility. Now, the McMaster Nuclear Reactor is Canada’s only major neutron source, and this project will complete its neutron beam lab by adding three neutron beamlines. To enable experiments that require high neutron brightness, the project will build partnerships with two world leading neutron beam facilities in the US.
Potential benefits of the research include technologies to reduced greenhouse gas emissions; enhanced reliability and competitiveness of Canadian nuclear power and auto parts manufacturing industries; knowledge to aid the fight against cancer, Alzheimer’s, and antibiotic resistance; and knowledge of quantum materials that could enable breakthroughs in information technology devices.
Author: Daniel Banks, President, TVB Associates Inc.
McMaster’s announcement: Five McMaster projects get $35M in federal funding (March 2021)
Photo: McMaster Nuclear Reactor (Photo by Georgia Kirkos, McMaster University)