The establishment, by the government of British Columbia, of the Leading Edge Endowment Fund (LEEF) was, in my opinion, an imaginative and creative policy decision. It was, and is, a wonderful example of how government can act with other social partners – in this case the universities of British Columbia – to enhance the future of the province – in this case with respect to meeting the challenges of globalization and the knowledge economy. (more…)

As a UBC undergrad, Martin Gleave won four national wrestling championships, five Western Canada wrestling championships and was named the university’s “Male Athlete of the Year” in 1983. He earned a degree in physical education. He then entered the Faculty of Medicine, intending to specialize in sports medicine and injuries. Instead, he became increasingly drawn to urology, the branch of medicine that deals with surgical care of diseases involving the urinary and male genital systems. His UBC medical degree in hand, he headed to the world famous M.D. Anderson Cancer Center at the University of Texas, where he studied the biology of prostate, bladder, kidney and testicular cancers. He returned to UBC in 1992 as a faculty member and clinician.

Today, Dr Gleave holds the Liber Ero BC Leadership Chair in Prostate Cancer Research and is Director of the Prostate Centre at Vancouver General Hospital (VGH). The Chair is supported by a $2.25 million award from the province’s Leading Edge Endowment Fund, matched by the VGH & UBC Hospital Foundation, with funds provided by Liber Ero Foundation, Mr. Lube Canada in memory of the late Ted Ticknor and other generous donors. (more…)

How does a boy from Saskatchewan develop an interest in ocean sciences? For Dr. Kim Juniper it was easy. “I watched the early Jacques Cousteau documentaries on television. I was inspired by his films!” Dr. Juniper is the newly-appointed BC Leadership Chair in Marine Ecosystems and Global change at the University of Victoria.

He has a B.Sc. in zoology from the University of Alberta and a Ph.D. in marine microbiology from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand. A subsequent post-doctoral fellowship at the Institute of Ocean Sciences at Sidney, BC, north of Victoria, got him interested in deep-sea ecology. “When I arrived at the Institute in 1983, my post-doc supervisor gave me a choice of two projects,” he recalls. “One was to study worms in drainage ditches around Victoria International Airport. The other was to take the Institute’s Pisces submarine and work in the depths of Saanich Inlet, a nearby fjord. I told him I’d like to start with the sub. Perhaps I could visit the worms later!”. (more…)

The great English poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, is just one entry on a long list of composers, painters, playwrights, poets, novelists and other creative people who suffered from severe depression. Indeed, this is the subject of a best-selling book, “Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament,” by Kay Redfield Jamison. But depression is hardly restricted to artists. The Mood Disorders Centre of Excellence at UBC Hospital in Vancouver estimates that some 500,000 British Columbians will suffer emotional distress, relationship problems and functional impairment due to depression. So the appointment of Dr. Allan Young as BC Leadership Chair in Depression Research is not only timely, but is an important step in efforts to better understand and treat the disease. (more…)

There’s a new resource in the West Kootenays. A grant of $1.25 million from the province’s Leading Edge Endowment Fund - - matched by local businesses, governments, foundations, credit unions and private individuals - has enabled Selkirk College in Castlegar to create a Regional Innovation Chair in Rural Economic Development. It’s the first of nine Regional Innovation Chairs the Leading Edge Endowment Fund plans to support over the next year. Community planner George Penfold has been appointed to fill the Chair at Selkirk College. He’s now launching the ambitious program. (more…)