Position 3. CRC Chair in Biosystematics -- Centre for Biodiversity Research (A joint initiative of the Departments of Zoology, Botany and Microbiology.)

We seek a Chair in Biodiversity to pursue the core aims of the Centre: to document Canada's biodiversity, to identify and monitor threatened species and habitats, and to advise on methods to mitigate threats to this biodiversity.

The Need:  Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of biological species are disappearing annually. A substantial fraction of the Earth’s biota is likely to be lost over the next century, and some environmental changes, such as global warming, may soon create climates outside the envelope experienced to date.  In response to this realization, the Canadian government promoted the Rio de Janeiro Biodiversity Convention of 1992 and has recently published the National Biodiversity Policy. However, there is an urgent need for new research and for expert advice on what and where biodiversity occurs.

There is now a worldwide shortage of biologists trained in biosystematics and hence there is a problem in identifying and understanding the diversity of organisms. Training in biosystematics, therefore, is one of the major areas that the Centre will address with the creation of a Chair in this field.

The Objectives: The Chair in Biosystematics will address the following:

Document and assess the biota of Canada: this will require a thorough understanding of the nature of biodiversity at each of the four major levels (genes, species, habitats, and ecosystems). Train students in these disciplines.

Develop a molecular species identification facility.  Modern techniques to identify differences in species and races within species use DNA techniques.  We will develop a molecular facility to conduct this research and the housing for the facility.

Public Education. The Centre will house biological collections and the research labs for the Chair in Biosystematics. The Chair will give public lectures on biodiversity issues in British Columbia and Canada.

Assets: There is already at UBC a core group of 16 scientists in Zoology and Botany that have expertise in ecology, genetics, evolution, and mathematics and these form the focus of our Centre for Biodiversity Research. In addition there are other scientists within these departments and also Microbiology, Earth and Ocean Sciences and Mathematics that form an extended group of 35 scientists. We also have multidisciplinary initiatives with the Fisheries Centre, Sustainable Development Research Institute, and the Centre for Applied Conservation Biology in Forestry.  The depth of this expertise in biodiversity related issues is without equal in Canada. The group is one of the strongest in the world.

There are biological collections in Insects, Fishes, Plants, Mammals, Birds and marine Protozoa that are unique in Canada and provide an invaluable start for studies in Canadian biodiversity.