Tag Archives: Henry Friesen

‘Building Canada’s “report card” for science, technology, and innovation’ and more stories from the Council of Canadian Academies (CCA) May 2925 newsletter (The Advance)

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I was very happy to see that a new edition of ‘The State of Science and Technology in Canada‘ or similarly named report from the Council of Canadian Academies (CCA). Here’s more about that report and others form the CCA’s May 2025 issue of The Advance (received via email),

Building Canada’s “report card” for science, technology, and innovation

In September 2006, the CCA published The State of Science and Technology in Canada—an expert assessment of the scientific disciplines and technological applications in which Canada excels. Commissioned by Industry Canada [or Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada or ISED], the report provided a much-needed foundation for benchmarking Canada’s strengths in science and technology; previously, the report noted, there was “almost no published literature focused specifically on strengths of the Canadian science and technology system overall, and particularly not at a reasonably fine level of detail.” The CCA has built upon its inaugural study ever since, steadily reassessing Canada’s science and technology strengths as well as the relationships between research, development, and innovation.

With our next assessment of Canada’s science, technology, and innovation ecosystem underway, with support from ISED’s Strategic Science Fund, we are revisiting our flagship assessments and their impacts on our collective understanding of science, technology, and innovation.

Read Science, Technology, and Innovation in Canada: Tracking Our Evolution.

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I found this in ‘Tracking Our Evolution‘,

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Two decades of expertise

For the inaugural edition of The State of Science and Technology in Canada, the CCA recruited a ten-person expert panel chaired by Elizabeth Dowdeswell, O.C. In order to create a well-rounded picture of Canadian innovation, the panel analyzed patents grants and citations as well as peer-reviewed journal publications; conducted an extensive literature review; and surveyed more than 1,500 experts on the strength and trajectory of Canada’s overall science and technology efforts and areas of note. The resulting report provided a broad sweep of expertise as well as granular information.

Since then, the CCA has published three additional assessments of Canada’s science, technology, and innovation performance, all at the request of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada. They include a second volume of The State of Science and Technology in Canada (2012); The State of Industrial Research and Development in Canada (2013); and Competing in a Global Innovation Economy (2018). This year, the CCA will publish a fifth installment focused on the current state of science, technology, and innovation.

[graphic]

Over the years, the CCA’s science and technology assessments have documented Canada’s reputation for world-leading infrastructure, high levels of education attainment, substantial research output and impact. They have also detailed declining R&D investment and intensity, and the accelerating outflow of Canada-born patents. They have identified sectors of R&D strength, from computer systems design to scientific research and development, and research-publication strengths in fields such as clinical medicine, public health, and the performing arts. Each assessment provides a multi-part assessment of Canada’s progress to-date, and an actionable platform for improving national prosperity, competitiveness, and well-being.

The CCA’s assessments have evolved in tandem with Canada’s science and technology landscape, expanding and refining the metrics on which we draw to detail its strengths and challenges. Our efforts include a Subcommittee on Science and Technology Research Methods, to provide recommendations for improving methodologies and closing data gaps. From research output to patents, from public- and private-sector investment to fields of global renown, each new assessment provides advanced methodologies for understanding Canadian innovation as it unfolds.

You can find out more the current iteration of The State of Science, Technology, and Innovation in Canada here including a listing with biographies of the report’s expert panel.

There’s more in the CCA’s May 2025 issue of The Advance,

Members of the Expert Panel on Balancing Research Security and Open Science for Dual-Use Research of Concern gathered in Ottawa in early May for a panel meeting, ahead of the project’s planned Fall 2025 release.

Learn more about the project and panel.

Readings and Events

  • CIFAR is now accepting applications for its Neuroscience of Consciousness Winter School, to be held in Montebello, Quebec. CIFAR describes the school as “a unique, three-day event where tomorrow’s neuroscience leaders work closely with world-class researchers.” The deadline for applications is June 23 [2025].
  • For the Conversation, a team of researchers examines Canada’s “fragmented immunization data” and a drop in vaccine confidence, then asks if the country is prepared for a new pandemic. “In 2024, 17 per cent of Canadian parents were ‘really against’ vaccinating their children, up from four per cent in 2019,” write the researchers, drawing on work by the CCA’s Expert Panel on the Socioeconomic Impacts of Science and Health Misinformation. (Noni MacDonald, a co-author, served as a member of the CCA panel.)
  • TamIA, the first piece of the Pan-Canadian AI Compute Environment (PAICE), launched at Université Laval. TamIA is a computing cluster that will work in tandem with infrastructure at the University of Alberta and the University of Toronto. Frédéric Chanay-Savoyen, Vice President of AI Solutions and Technology at Mila, a PAICE partner, says TamIA’s increased computing capacity “makes it possible to develop an environment that fosters interdisciplinary collaboration on a national scale and that will allow Quebec and Canada to maintain its position as a leader in the field of cutting-edge AI research.”
  • The Open Notebook, a nonprofit that supports science journalists, recently asked a group of reporters how they navigate research reports, especially those that are hundreds (or thousands) of pages long. Their responses hold insights for all members of the science media.
  • Dr. Henry Friesen, best known for his discovery of prolactin and his trailblazing research on human growth hormones, died on April 30 at 90 years old. Friesen, a former member of the CCA’s Board of Governors, helped lead the development of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and is a member of the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame, among many other honours. 

My October 17, 2024 posting “AI and Canadian science diplomacy & more stories from the October 2024 Council of Canadian Academies (CCA) newsletter” provides some insight, which is still salient, about artificial intelligence scene (policy, diplomacy, etc.) in Canada..

There you have it.

2017 proceedings for the Canadian Science Policy Conference

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I received (via email) a December 11, 2017 notice from the Canadian Science Policy Centre that the 2017 Proceedings for the ninth annual conference (Nov. 1 – 3, 2017 in Ottawa, Canada) can now be accessed,

The Canadian Science Policy Centre is pleased to present you the Proceedings of CSPC 2017. Check out the reports and takeaways for each panel session, which have been carefully drafted by a group of professional writers. You can also listen to the audio recordings and watch the available videos. The proceedings page will provide you with the opportunity to immerse yourself in all of the discussions at the conference. Feel free to share the ones you like! Also, check out the CSPC 2017 reports, analyses, and stats in the proceedings.

Click here for the CSPC 2017 Proceedings

CSPC 2017 Interviews

Take a look at the 70+ one-on-one interviews with prominent figures of science policy. The interviews were conducted by the great team of CSPC 2017 volunteers. The interviews feature in-depth perspectives about the conference, panels, and new up and coming projects.

Click here for the CSPC 2017 interviews

Amongst many others, you can find a video of Governor General Julie Payette’s notorious remarks made at the opening ceremonies and which I highlighted in my November 3, 2017 posting about this year’s conference.

The proceedings are organized by day with links to individual pages for each session held that day. Here’s a sample of what is offered on Day 1: Artificial Intelligence and Discovery Science: Playing to Canada’s Strengths,

Artificial Intelligence and Discovery Science: Playing to Canada’s Strengths

Audio Files:
Artificial Intelligence and Discovery Science: Playing to Canada’s strengths
Conference Day:
Day 1 – November 1st 2017

Organized by: Friends of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research

Keynote: Alan Bernstein, President and CEO, CIFAR, 2017 Henry G. Friesen International Prizewinner

Speakers: Brenda Andrews, Director, Andrew’s Lab, University of Toronto; Doina Precup, Associate Professor, McGill University; Dr Rémi Quirion, Chief Scientist of Quebec; Linda Rabeneck, Vice President, Prevention and Cancer Control, Cancer Care Ontario; Peter Zandstra, Director, School of Biomedical Engineering, University of British Columbia

Discussants: Henry Friesen, Professor Emeritus, University of Manitoba; Roderick McInnes, Acting President, Canadian Institutes of Health Research and Director, Lady Davis Institute, Jewish General Hospital, McGill University; Duncan J. Stewart, CEO and Scientific Director, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute; Vivek Goel, Vice President, Research and Innovation, University of Toronto

Moderators: Eric Meslin, President & CEO, Council of Canadian Academies; André Picard, Health Reporter and Columnist, The Globe and Mail

Takeaways and recommendations:

The opportunity for Canada

  • The potential impact of artificial intelligence (AI) could be as significant as the industrial revolution of the 19th century.
  • Canada’s global advantage in deep learning (a subset of machine learning) stems from the pioneering work of Geoffrey Hinton and early support from CIFAR and NSERC.
  • AI could mark a turning point in Canada’s innovation performance, fueled by the highest levels of venture capital financing in nearly a decade, and underpinned by publicly funded research at the federal, provincial and institutional levels.
  • The Canadian AI advantage can only be fully realized by developing and importing skilled talent, accessible markets, capital and companies willing to adopt new technologies into existing industries.
  • Canada leads in the combination of functional genomics and machine learning which is proving effective for predicting the functional variation in genomes.
  • AI promises advances in biomedical engineering by connecting chronic diseases – the largest health burden in Canada – to gene regulatory networks by understanding how stem cells make decisions.
  • AI can be effectively deployed to evaluate health and health systems in the general population.

The challenges

  • AI brings potential ethical and economic perils and requires a watchdog to oversee standards, engage in fact-based debate and prepare for the potential backlash over job losses to robots.
  • The ethical, environmental, economic, legal and social (GEL3S) aspects of genomics have been largely marginalized and it’s important not to make the same mistake with AI.
  • AI’s rapid scientific development makes it difficult to keep pace with safeguards and standards.
  • The fields of AI’s and pattern recognition are strongly connected but here is room for improvement.
  • Self-learning algorithms such as Alphaville could lead to the invention of new things that humans currently don’t know how to do. The field is developing rapidly, leading to some concern over the deployment of such systems.

Training future AI professionals

  • Young researchers must be given the oxygen to excel at AI if its potential is to be realized.
  • Students appreciate the breadth of training and additional resources they receive from researchers with ties to both academia and industry.
  • The importance of continuing fundamental research in AI is being challenged by companies such as Facebook, Google and Amazon which are hiring away key talent.
  • The explosion of AI is a powerful illustration of how the importance of fundamental research may only be recognized and exploited after 20 or 30 years. As a result, support for fundamental research, and the students working in areas related to AI, must continue.
Documents:
File CSPC 2017 Takeaway: AI

A couple comments

To my knowledge, this is the first year the proceedings have been made so easily accessible. In fact, I can’t remember another year where they have been open access. Thank you!

Of course, I have to make a comment about the Day 2 session titled: Does Canada have a Science Culture? The answer is yes and it’s in the province of Ontario. Just take a look at the panel,

Organized by: Kirsten Vanstone, Royal Canadian Institute for Science and Reinhart Reithmeier, Professor, University of Toronto [in Ontario]

Speakers: Chantal Barriault, Director, Science Communication Graduate Program, Laurentian University [in Ontario] and Science North [in Ontario]; Maurice Bitran, CEO, Ontario Science Centre [take a wild guess as to where this institution is located?]; Kelly Bronson, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ottawa [in Ontario]; Marc LePage, President and CEO, Genome Canada [in Ontario]

Moderator: Ivan Semeniuk, Science Reporter, The Globe and Mail [in Ontario]

In fact, all of the institutions are in southern Ontario, even, the oddly named Science North.

I know from bitter experience it’s hard to put together panels but couldn’t someone from another province have participated?

Ah well, here’s hoping for 2018 and for a new location. After Ottawa as the CSPC site for three years in a row, please don’t make it a fourth year in a row.