Faculty of Agricultural & Environmental Sciences
On Campus
Charting a course for Mac’s future
Salwa Karboune, the dean of the Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, hopes to improve the infrastructure for research at Macdonald Campus, while forging closer ties with McGill’s downtown campus. She is certain about one thing. The world has never needed the expertise of Mac’s researchers more than it does today.
On Campus
Celebrating McGill’s Morgan Arboretum
McGill’s Morgan Arboretum celebrates its 80th anniversary during Homecoming later this month with a flurry of activities on Macdonald Campus. From teaching and research to conservation and recreation activities, the 245-hectare Arboretum is a beloved urban ecological space.
Health
Helping Montreal prepare for the next public health emergency
As the deputy medical director at Montreal Public Health, David Kaiser, BSc’03, MDCM’09, MSc’13, oversees emergency preparedness. His holistic perspective on health issues was forged, in part, during his environmental sciences studies at McGill.
Discovery
Better, longer lives for cattle, courtesy of AI
Can artificial intelligence help dairy cows have healthier lives? That’s what McGill’s Elsa Vasseur plans to find out as one of the co-chairs of the new Research and Innovation Chair in Animal Welfare and Artificial Intelligence.
Health
Exploring nutrition through a high-tech lens
McGill’s Clinical Nutrition Research Unit, a key part of the School of Human Nutrition at Macdonald Campus, has a new home and vastly improved infrastructure for cutting-edge studies. The CNRU is pursuing a wide variety of projects with one common ingredient – the instrumental role that nutrition plays in keeping us healthy.
Discovery
Exploring the complexity of ecosystems
As McGill’s Canada Research Chair in Sustainability Science, Elena Bennett is one of the country’s most respected experts on the nature of Canada’s ecosystems – the varied benefits they offer, as well as their vulnerability to change.
Health
McGill’s Moderna connection
Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine is one of the planet’s best hopes for prevailing against a pandemic that has affected millions around the world. Noubar Afeyan, BEng’83 (pictured), is the company's co-founder, while Hamilton Bennett, BSc(FSc)’07, is one of the principal players leading Moderna’s vaccine efforts.
On Campus
Training farmers for the 21st century
Keesha Ness’s family certainly knows farming – they’ve been doing it for nearly 100 years and plan to celebrate when they reach that milestone next summer.
Discovery
Research in the era of legal cannabis
The legalization of marijuana in Canada “has really opened the floodgates for cannabis research,” says Carolyn Baglole, the director of the new McGill Research Centre for Cannabis. The new centre, which involves six McGill faculties, will examine cannabis in a comprehensive way, “from plants to people to policy.”
People
She came, she sawed, she conquered
McGill master’s student Stéphanie Bélanger-Naud, FMT’14, BSc(AgEnvSc)’17, had a summer to remember. Thanks to her skills with buck saws and axes, she won a national timbersports championship while finishing second in an international competition.
Discovery
A big step forward for sustainability
McGill experts in environmental sustainability are busy examining everything from the causes of locust swarms to the toxic impact of mountains of e-waste. The McGill Sustainability Systems Initiative aims to marshal that broad range of expertise and direct it towards some of the planet’s biggest challenges.
People
Diving into the history of the Earth
Prosanta Chakrabarty, BSc(Agr)’00, goes cave-diving and trawling to find new species of fish to learn more about the earth’s history. In his world travels, the Montreal-born, New York-raised ichthyologist has discovered – and named – 13 new species of fish.