2017-18 Travelers' log

Albania

Matvey Lomonosov

Sociology

"I worked in archives and libraries in Albania and Macedonia. The information I was looking [for] was essential to fill gaps in my dissertation. In Albania, I was happy to find a document I have been looking [for] since last year. That document is crucial to ground my argument in one of the dissertation chapters. In Macedonia, I did an extensive search of primary sources in periodicals unavailable in North America.

"An additional benefit of this travel was my visit to Belgrade archives in Serbia. As my experience proves, it is usually hard to receive any preliminary information about local archives online. You actually need to go there and ask what forms are required and what collections exist. This is what I did in Belgrade. In order to turn my dissertation into a book, Belgrade archives are essential."

Australia

Sarah Mah

Geography

Neighbourhood environments are becoming increasingly recognized as being determinants of physical activity that could mitigate rising obesity and type 2 diabetes rates. The Graduate Mobility Award was an important contributor to the comparative work we are undertaking to understand active living environments in different international contexts. We have now identified and done preliminary analyses on datasets in Australia that can be matched with Canada, and a cross-university collaboration between McGill University, University of Melbourne and RMIT has been established. We will continue this work well into next year, and this will form at least one chapter of the dissertation, as well as a peer-reviewed manuscript.

 

Austria

Anna-Sophie Neher

Music Performance

"​The mobility award gave me the opportunity to compete in my first international competition: the International Mozart Competition in Sazlburg. What an incredible learning experience it was!!

I have never been so nervous in my entire life and even with very little sleep, I still managed to qualify for the semi-finals of the competition. I am very proud to have been selected as one of the 16 singers worldwide to be in the semi-finals.

During those two weeks, I learned a lot about myself, about the European way of singing, about the competition world.

Thank you so much for your support!"

 

Barbados

Sandeep Manjanna

School of Computer Science

"My travel for research to Bellairs Research Institute was very beneficial and fruitful. I was able to conduct some of the experiments that will enhance my research outcomes. The main reason for choosing Bellairs research institute in Barbados is that it is a facility by McGill University that has a good access to marine environment necessary for my experiments. Also, Bellairs research institute has been working on improving the health of the nearby coral reefs and has a region of reef reserved for research. I could meet and talk to marine biologists working on reef-health project and we discussed several mutually beneficial collaborations. It was a great opportunity and a learning experience. I would like to thank the Graduate Mobility Award for making this happen."

Belgium

Mikkel Jorgensen

Urban Planning

"I participated in a course on Space Debris provided by the European Space agency. The course consisted of 18 lectures on the complete space debris scenario, from determining the causes and generation of space debris to space law to tracking the debris and how to deal with the problems that it causes for near Earth space operations. The course also included 5 exercises which involved spacecraft and debris propagation, spacecraft tracking, active debris removal design, and re-entry calculations."

 

Canada

Amelie Fontaine

Agricultural Economics

"I met for the first time in person two members of my supervisory committee. 
I went on the field with their team and gained valuable experiences on various techniques and protocols for bat house survey, guano and DNA sample, count, school presentation and more importantly, on capture and pit tagging. Mr. Willis and his team use various methods such as, harp trap, mist net, bat box trap to capture bats. I also learned how to be more efficient during manipulations and pit tagging. I also learned of how it is not easy to catch bats at the same place with the same method during many consecutive years. They are smarter than you think!"

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Anthony Zerafa

Biology

"I am very grateful for having received funding from the Faculty of Science Graduate Mobility Award. The cost of conducting fieldwork in the High Arctic is immense, and so every little bit helps. This funding enabled me to carry out something completely new, and has laid the foundations for a long-term monitoring program of terrestrial arthropods on Axel Heiberg Island with the purpose of detecting Arctic environmental change. Thank you very much for your support!"

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Emily Studd

Natural Resource Sciences

"My travel mobility award funded a semester long research stay at the University of Alberta within Dr. Boutin's lab group. I spent this time working along side other members of the Kluane Predator Prey Team, a multi-university research project. This strengthened our collaborative efforts and allowed us to push forward several team projects/papers that we have been discussing doing for some time... For my own thesis work, being surrounded by that department and the Boutin lab, along with 2 meetings a week with the lab, motivated me to finishing analysis and writing of two manuscripts... I also had the opportunity to take advantage of the bioacoustics laboratory at the University, to create an analytical method for the acoustic data that I have collected throughout my thesis.

"... From this amazing experience, I received plenty of useful feedback on my work and was able to network with a variety of people that I would not normally have interacted with. I also got to attend weekly seminars given by internationally prominent researchers that were visiting the University."

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Joshua Persi

Biology

"The mobility award allowed me to take part in a large, international experiment testing the intensity of seed predation across elevation."

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Mike Davis

History and Classical Studies

"While at the Library and Archives Canada I was able to consult many microfilm reels relating to my thesis project. Initially, I was able to examine copies of Admiralty documents from the Archives Charente Maritime in La Rochelle, France which directly relate to capture of the island of Nevis in 1706 by Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville, which forms the basis of the current chapter I am working on. These documents have been little examined by historians and I hope will add a great depth to my chapter. I was also able to consult and make copies of the official correspondence from Louisiana which will be useful for later chapters in my thesis concerning the governance of the French colony from 1716-1740."

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Sean Jordan

Music - Voice and Opera

"Because of this grant, I was able to participate in real-world work in opera. I am now more confident and better prepared to perform old-style Italian opera, and along the way I have made important connections within the early music and opera scene in Canada and the United States...

"I had an overwhelmingly positive experience at this festival, as it furthered my musical and acting education on an operatic stage."

Colombia

Andrea Santa

Natural Resource Sciences

"During my experience I was able to collaborate with two universities: Universidad del Rosario and Universidad de Cartagena:

- At the University of El Rosario I gained experience in the politics related with Artisanal Gold mining, developed a proposal for future research

- At the University of Cartagena I worked with fisherman to understand the problems related to lead, I was on a radio interview, I went to an Artisanal and Small Scale Gold Mining Community where I had the opportunity to collect Dried Blood Spots samples and understand the problem on mercury contamination first hand, I gave a talk on the problems related with Hg to the graduate students in toxicology."

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Simon Mammone

Urban Planning

"The experience enabled me to connect with students from all over South America and to further explore issues related to my field of study. My trip also allowed me to live unique intellectual and cultural experiences that would not have been possible if I would have travelled on my own. The most enlightening experience was to be welcomed in an informal settlement and being able to conduct research in a usually inaccessible and dangerous area."

 

Egypt

Omar Edaitbat

Islamic Studies

"My trip to Egypt and Jordan was to conduct crucial fieldwork for the final two chapters of my dissertation project. My objective was to document the yet unwritten story of the recent rise and spread of the Ba Aalwi Sufi order in Middle Eastern countries such as Jordan and Egypt, where their leading scholars and disciples are playing a key role in the revival of Sufi spirituality in the region and in evolving religious discourses in these two countries in particular.

"Aside from being able to accumulate more crucial primary sources, through these two visits and the many on the ground connections made, I now have a much more complete picture of the impact of the Ba Alawi tradition's activities and religious activities in these two countries and its crucial role in the shaping of their contemporary spiritual life and religious discourses."

 

Ethiopia

Hani Sadati

Integrated Studies in Education

"This experience was the first phase of my research and it included individual interviews and Cellphilming workshops. The interviews and workshops were conducted in 4 agriculture colleges in 4 different regions of Ethiopia. I worked with college instructors to learn more from them about instructors' educational needs and their barriers in addressing sexual and gender based violence in the colleges."

Finland

Bismarck Ledezma-Navarro

Civil Engineering

"Most of the lectures in the summer school provided an open perspective on how we should start to think about the road users... It was a very productive experience, gaining an open vision of where and how we could aim our research. Additionally, the knowledge gained with the other students of the school, I think it was some of the most valuable things of this experience, talking with students and professionals from other areas of transportation, helped to increase the knowledge in the field. Plus, the experience of visiting a Nordic country, it is always learning about a way of living.

"It was a wonderful experience, and it is excellent that the university has this type of support for students, to increase their knowledge of research and adventures abroad. Thank you for the opportunity."

 

France

Alex Ezenagu

Law

"Upon arrival in Paris on June 18, 2018, I proceeded to the venue of the IDW... for registration and to pick up my registration package. Same day, June 18, my thesis chapter, “Re-thinking Theories of Taxation in an Interconnected World” was up for peer review... Overall, the thesis chapter was commended for presenting a clear, easy-to-read analysis of tax issues, which are usually complex. I spent the other days of the week attending writing workshops, lectures on legal writing and peer review meetings.

“I am grateful to the Faculty of Law and the university for awarding me the GRMA. My research certainly will benefit immensely from it. As I wrap up my PhD thesis, I am grateful to the organisers of the IDW, Sciences Po, Paris to spend a week at the beautiful campus discussing my research and learning from other academics. I am indeed very grateful.”

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Ashley Chau-Morris

Psychiatry

“This was my second trip to Paris. I enjoyed it even more than the first, and found it just as rewarding in terms of the knowledge acquired. The first trip was really based in methodology and the pre-experiment set-up and logistics. However, in this most recent trip we got to share the data we had both been working hard to collect. It was very gratifying to see our labor coming to fruition. We made important decisions for the future direction of the project, as well as different ways to analyze the data.

“I am very grateful not only for the research experience gained, but also the friendships made. Each of these visits to the collaborating lab has been warm, and eye opening to alternative ways of thinking.”

 

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Bailey Wantuch

Music Performance

“The Zodiac Festival provided me with several new, important connections with other musicians, both students and teachers. I was able to work closely with composer Patrick Wu, whose new piano trio I premiered with Kendra Grittani and Riko Higuma. We workshopped the piece with the resident composition faculty member, Andrew List, who provided us with immediate feedback. Kendra and I also studied and performed a movement of Ravel's Sonata for Violin and Cello, and we were awarded "Best Chamber Ensemble Performance" of the year. Our coach was violinist Vanessa Mollard. In addition, I gave the Cote d'Azur premiere of Shulamit Ran's Inscriptions for Solo Violin, and exposed the entire festival to this amazing piece by a female composer. With the help of my wonderful teacher Sarah Plum, I was named "Young Artist of the Year" by the Zodiac Trio and other faculty members.

 

Germany

Evgeniya Makarova

Art History and Communications

"My main objective was to select a sample of compliant German artists working in the genre of architectural representation, while completing my Comps bibliography with a review of primary sources. All of these tasks required access to the ZI archives and the Bavarian State Library. Thanks to the availability of these resources and constructive feedback provided by the ZI researchers, I was able to make significant progress on my dissertation. Insights provided by Dr. Fuhrmeister have been incredibly helpful in refining my theoretical and methodological approaches to National Socialist art... Working closely with the RIHA journal editor in chief Andrea Lermer, I learned about peer review processes for scientific publications on architectural history... Finally, Paul Jascot’s workshop (May 18, 2018) organized exclusively for ZI researchers introduced me to the ways digital technologies can be used specifically to provide new insights into National Socialist architecture.

"Overall, I hope to have demonstrated that my research stay at ZI was extremely productive: it provided me with a unique opportunity to work on my dissertation, while also connecting with some of the most important scholars in the fields of art history, architectural theory, provenance research and museum studies. I am extremely grateful to the Faculty of Arts for making this experience possible!"

 

India

Megha Kumar

Urban Planning

"The mobility award provided funding support that was crucial to advance my research. The mobility award was used to facilitate field visit for my research. I met various experts and academicians and gained their insight on the problem. The mobility award also allowed my to visit Bangalore, the city of my research interest and helped me gain a better understanding of the field conditions."

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Urvi Desai

History and Classical Studies

"I have been working with, learning from, and collaborating with law students and faculty at two of the finest academic institutes in India: Gujarat Vidyapeeth (Ahmedabad, Gujarat) and NALSAR (Hyderabad, Telangana). It has been an extremely stimulating and rewarding experience towards better research techniques and training for my project."

Israel

Christopher Nzediegwu

Bioresource Engineering

"The aim of the research was to check if biochar and hydrochar produced from cattle manure can reduce the uptake of heavy metals by crops grown on an e-waste contaminated site. I produced biochar and hydrochar from cattle manure. The produced chars and soils were characterised for heavy metals such as Pb and Cu using ICP-OES. I learnt how to perform elemental characteristics of biochar and hydrochar using a CHNS/O analyser. I also learnt how to determine ash content of biochar and hydrochar. I set-up two different experiments (toxicity and uptake) using the biochar and hydrochar. I was able to work with people from different background seamlessly."

 

Italy

Hayley Eaves

Art History and Communications

"From January to early April 2018, I was a resident scholar at the Centro Vittore Branca in Venice, Italy. Whilst at the Center, I had the unique opportunity to consult with both the Zatta and Pasquali editions of the complete works of Venetian playwright, Carlo Goldoni (1707-1793)... What's more,while the project was conducted as an extension of my thesis, I was too able to gather significant insight toward my MA."

"While the majority of my research took place at the Centro, I too spent several weeks at the Goldoni House Museum, the Marciana Library, and the Correr Library which enabled me to consult with a vast collection of librettos, primary texts, prints, and drawings. I too had the opportunity to practice my Italian speaking and reading skills. Beyond this, the time I spent in the archives and at on-site libraries enabled me to metaphorically absorb the flavor of the Venice - the city in which my thesis takes place. Thus, this was a truly once-in-a-lifetime experience, one for which I am truly grateful."

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Michael Rollings

Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences

"The lectures were at the perfect academic level for me, they were more advanced then my classes and pushed me, but were still pedagogical. I also met many experts in my field and was able to connect with them over the two weeks and get direct advice on my thesis project and other general scientific pursuits. I was also able to connect with many graduate students from other elite universities around the world, some of whom will be the future of this field."

Japan

Tyler Enright

Physics

"During my research at the Tokyo Institute of Technology I got some world class experience in sample preparation of an important material. During my time there I became familiar with glass blowing, glove box preparations, precise sample mixing and milling, and floating zone crystal growth techniques. Through these actions, alongside professors and postdocs who worked directly with me for long periods of time, I was able to create several samples...  Additionally, I had the opportunity to meet and discuss new, cutting edge material synthesis which shows a lot of promise both for further collaborations and as materials with useful properties for science and society at large."

Kenya

Klerkson Lugusa

Natural Resource Sciences

"I was able to undertake my field research smoothly where I collected data on economics of conservation as seen through conservancies in Samburu East sub-county. I employed both quantitative and qualitative data collection techniques in the process as well as Q methodology developed by William Stephenson."

Mexico

Ivan Sarmiento Combariza

Family Medicine

"This funding provided the resources to implement part of the dissemination plan contemplated in the research project entitled Safety birth and cultural safety among indigenous communities in Guerrero. From July 3 to 14, 2018 a PhD student from the Department of Family Medicine at McGill University traveled to the southern state of Guerrero in Mexico to discuss the results from previous stages of the project with indigenous traditional midwives and local researchers."

Netherlands

Ashutosh Kumar

Institute of Islamic Studies

"The workshop was a huge success at bringing together a small group of scholars and experts working with Indo-Persian documents and manuscripts written in a highly stylised cursive script in Persian. We learnt about ways to decode the script and became familiar with the resources available to help our understanding of these documents. Finally, the workshop provided us with an opportunity to work with a variety of documents from precolonial and early colonial South Asia composed in this script and to transcribe/translate them. The intensive learning environment at the workshop was extremely helpful in raising our knowledge of and skills in reading Indo-Persian documents."

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Braden Scott

Art History

"I knew that I needed to take Dutch lessons ever since my doctoral degree initiated in 2016. There are no institutional courses of Dutch in the city of Montreal, so I had to look elsewhere. Having the opportunity to travel to the Netherlands and partake in a Dutch class was an experience that turned out to be extremely beneficial to my research. On one hand, I was learning the language -- two levels -- of a language that I needed in order to read primary sources, and on the other hand, I was seeing the country, cities, and art and architecture of the place and period of my study. I was able to access archives in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem, and the Boijmans of Rotterdam, while viewing the collections with primary artefacts in Leiden, Utrecht, Delft, Heemskerk, and the Hague. This was formative research for me, and was the first time I was able to see works that are included in my dissertation prospectus. Having the ability to spend time in the Netherlands and slowly research while I am taking intensive, daily language classes was only possible with external funding. Thank you :)"

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Karla Sayegh

Management

"As a senior PhD student in the area of expertise collaboration, technology and organizing, the VU KIN summer school on knowledge and innovation was instrumental to the progress of my research. Customized paper feedback sessions, personalized interactions and theory-method workshops with leading scholars in my research conversation proved invaluable in developing and further focusing my thesis work for top-tier publication."

Palestine

Nuha Shaer

Social Work

"I worked closely with urban planners at The Ministry of Local Government (MoLG) of the State of Palestine and UN Habitat. During the internship, I worked with the urban planning unit and the local communities to develop frameworks for Palestinian communities to realize authorized increases in housing rights, enhance sustainable development and build resilience in Jenin Area. Through this work, I developed new connections with two communities located in the semi-Zone behind the Separation Barrier: Emreha and Umm Al-Rihan community.

"I continued working with the MoLG on the preparation of a policy document on tenure security and housing rights for Bedouin and pastoral communities after I came back to Canada.

"Also, I developed new connections with the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission. I worked with the social workers to promote advocacy efforts for changes in the restrictive planning system of so called Area C."

Panama

Ayman Jalloul

Urban Planning

"We had great opportunity to see and work on urban planning in a different context. We collected data from site visits and presentation and synthesized them into a project which we proposed there and got feedback on for future development and possible publication."

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Jannat Nain

Urban Planning

"Along with a team of students, I developed a travel accessibility plan to integrate active transportation pathways and connections to the 'Nuevo Tocumen' station being added to the new Metro line in Panama City. Through the studio, we explored issues of living standards in informal communities by analyzing the impact and effectiveness of emergency housing. Additionally, we developed our plan utilizing on the existing road network and urban form to capitalize on access to public transportation."

Russia

Nikolai Choubine

Languages, Literatures, and Cultures

"My experiences during this exploratory trip revealed that the bourgeois culture of the pre-revolutionary south-western part of Russia is an under-explored topic and that people are not asking the kinds of questions about the era and culture as I hope to. It is a topic that has a lot of potential for scholarly research that could further our understanding of the provincial bourgeois Russian culture and by extension the Russian émigré diaspora. I believe I have made some connections with people who may be able to help me and hope that this will lead to more opportunities to undertake further research in Krasnodar and other cities in the region.

"Overall my mobility experience has been a positive one. I am grateful to have received a Graduate Mobility Award. Thank you."

 

South Korea

Dahye Kim

East Asian Studies

"The research trip was to find and archive the material needed for my dissertation on the early online South Korean science fandom culture... I was lucky enough to get a free access to the library at Yonsei University in Seoul, as well as a desk in the Yonsei Media Research Lab with the help and hospitality of professor Baek Moonim of Korean Literature department at Yonsei. During my stay I spent most of my time reading and writing, while also conducting several research interviews with South Korean science fiction writers like Bok Geo-il, Song Kyung-ah, Kwak Jae-sik, etc. Since my primary and secondary research sources are almost only available in South Korea, this research trip was crucial for my dissertation project, and it was a productive trip. Having various material at hand was very helpful for my writing process.

"Thank you very much for providing me this wonderful opportunity. Getting Graduate Mobility Award helped me greatly in terms of financing this travel.Thank you very much for providing me this wonderful opportunity. Getting Graduate Mobility Award helped me greatly in terms of financing this travel."

Switzerland

Alessandro Ambler

Physics

"The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) is the most powerful accelerator in the world, colliding protons together at speeds close to the speed of light. The ATLAS detector, located at one of the LHC's interaction points, takes what can be thought of as ""digital pictures"" of the outgoing particles from these collisions to study the properties and interactions of elementary particles. The main focus of my research project as a Ph.D. student at McGill is to analyze data collected by ATLAS and search for a yet unobserved interaction that is predicted to exist by the Standard Model of particle physics. The interaction consists of the production of a W boson and two photons.

"The objective of my trip to CERN was to contribute to the operation of the ATLAS detector during data taking. More specifically, the task involved the control and monitoring of the calorimeter system, the ATLAS subsystem responsible for the measuring the energy of photons, electrons and hadronic jets. The deeper understanding of the detector that I gained during my stay at CERN will prove useful to my project, which relies heavily on information from the calorimeter system and the calorimeter's performance. In addition, I had the opportunity to meet and learn from experts in the field, which has already proven to be invaluable to my research as a member of the ATLAS collaboration."

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Nancy Soni

Plant Science

"In one word, it was amazing! I believe this opportunity should be given more and more to the graduate students. For me, it was a dream come true. Working at ETH, Zurich used to be my dream since I was doing my masters degree back home. And, graduate mobility award actually fulfilled my dream of doing research over there. Honestly, every graduate student should experience this. You might be doing well in your laboratory or university but it is important to get aware of what is happening the other side of the world. You might think that you can get to know everything from the internet, but unless you have experienced it yourself, you can never learn the most of it. Apart from research, you get to know the different working environment which is again very important for any researcher to grow. Nobody is perfect! For me, it was life changing experience. I really wish to get this opportunity again, if possible."

Tanzania

Joanna Ondrusek-Roy

Geography

"I travelled to Tanzania for a period of 10 weeks to carry out interviews with stakeholders involved in the planning and implementation of 8 new satellite city projects. In that period I met with government officials, planners and developers; I visited several new city sites around Zanzibar, Dar es Salaam, Dodoma and Arusha; I attended new-city events and collected relevant archival materials. This fieldwork was essential to my thesis research which seeks to investigate the drivers of new city building, international networks of urban policy sharing and the urban development context in Tanzania... Through this fieldwork I improved my Swahili, gained essential qualitative research experience and transferable life skills.

"Thank you to the Faculty of Science for their financial support of my fieldwork, without which the completion of my thesis would not have been possible."

Uganda

William Nesbitt

Earth and Planetary Science

"The Graduate Mobility Award allowed me to travel to Uganda, East Africa to undertake a research project this summer. This provided an academic experience like none other, allowing me to apply sampling and analytical techniques in the field that I have learned over the course of my M.Sc.. My troubleshooting skills were further developed when I was forced to adapt to the challenges of employing these techniques (i.e. sampling, treating samples, pH) in such a remote location with limited resources available.

"This was not only an academic experience, but a cultural one. Interacting with communities, experiencing their practices and way of life, and becoming involved with the local school provided me the opportunity to learn and to share, which in turn allowed me to further become a global citizen."

United Kingdom

Brooke Levis

Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Occupational Health

"In March 2018, I travelled to Keele University in the UK in order to participate in a 3-day training course on statistical methods for risk prediction and prognostic models... The course was  the perfect complement to my training at McGill University, and taught me skills and methods that I will directly apply in my thesis work... Over the 3 days, the course included theoretical lectures as well as interactive tutorials... The course also had a specific session on methods for developing  models using large datasets from multiple studies, which was of particular relevance to my thesis, which uses an IPD meta-analysis framework. As described above, my participation in the course has well prepared me to conduct the third and final project for my PhD thesis, which is the development of a prediction model for generating personalized depression risk estimates. In addition to the course content, I also had the opportunity to discuss my specific project with the course leaders, and they provided me with valuable insight and suggestions for my upcoming project. Beyond the course and discussions. I was also offered the opportunity to return to Keele University in the future for an internship or fellowship."

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David Anthony Basham

Religious Studies

"I sought the supervision of Dr. Sean Adams at the University of Glasgow for his expertise in the early Christian work known as the Acts of the Apostles. Through access to the University's library and museum, as well as regular meetings with Dr. Adams, I grew in my understanding of the ancient Jewish and Greco-Roman contexts in which this work was written. Meetings with Dr. Adams also included his guidance concerning the transition from graduate studies to teaching posts and how to make oneself competitive amongst other job candidates.

"The University of Glasgow and city of Glasgow are active, vibrant, and welcoming. The funding afforded me the time to develop a potential thesis in an academically-inspiring environment."

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Morgan Crowley

Natural Resource Sciences

"The Graduate Mobility Award was extremely vital to my program development ... I was able to finance the trip tailored to the award amount without additional financial burden because it was set up as a pre-trip award rather than a post-trip reimbursement. This summit has already had lasting impacts on my research networks and collaborative opportunities, and I am extremely grateful to McGill Graduate Studies and the Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Studies for making this trip possible. The workshops broadened my programming skills and put them to the test, and I learned streamlined methods to overcome difficulties in my research... To make the most out of my Graduate Mobility Funding, I pushed myself outside of my comfort zone to introduce myself to top scientists in my field, to attend every session that was offered, and to take advantage of every opportunity while in Dublin."

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Saeed Babadi

Kinesiology and Physical Education

"I had the opportunity to visit Physiological Neuroimaging Group in University of Oxford whose research lines are close to my project. I could learn about some techniques which are supplement to our research. I had the chance to present my project, also discuss it with a number of researchers and receive their feedback. Furthermore, I spent some time in a new and sort of different environment that was very interesting. Overall, it was a great experience for me and is certainly helpful for my current research as well as future career.

"I think Graduate Mobility Award is one of the best and most useful travel awards that a grad student could get. Thanks very much McGill!"

USA

Anthony Gifuni

Integrated Program in Neuroscience

"​The main objective of my stay at Mary Phillips’s lab was to develop new skills in analyzing multimodal neuroimaging data. At the Douglas Institute, I am currently investigating the neural correlates of suicidal behavior in adolescents. Bringing a nearly complete, yet preliminary dataset, I expanded my analysis in several neuroimaging modalities...

"I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the GPS office for their support. This award made an immense difference, supporting me financially while I was there and facilitating the visa process."

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Bernard Hagan

Agricultural Economics

"​I had interesting interactions with a number of graduate students from across the globe. Through participation in this award I have had a better understanding of the genetic evaluation of farm animals especially dairy cattle using both genotype and phenotypic information. I had a first hand practice of Fortran programming for genetic evaluation of both production and type traits. I can now write better and optimum programs with fortran. 

"The participation in this short course had also enhanced my confidence in working with genomic data."

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Claire Guimond

Earth and Planetary Science

"​I worked with Dr. Victoria Meadows at the University of Washington, PI of the Virtual Planet Laboratory, learning about techniques to analyze phase curves and spectra of terrestrial exoplanets. We plan to publish our results on identifying Earth-like planets using these techniques in a peer-reviewed journal.

"At the Virtual Planet Laboratory, I got to access a cutting-edge astrophysical model and meet a lot of radical young scientists in my field."

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Fannie Dionne

History and Classical Studies

"I went to the John Carter Brown library to see a manuscript and the documentation of its acquisition. I already had a digitalized copy of it before going to the library. But by looking at the real manuscript, I was able to [see] a lot of important writing not visible on the digitalized copy. The documentation of the acquisition was incredible and unveiled a story of fraud from the beginning of the 20th century!"

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Ghada Ayoub

Chemistry

"During my stay at Northwestern University, I was working on the synthesis of materials by using solvothermal routes which we don't perform in our lab. I was taught how to conduct these synthesis and respect all the safety protocols that should be adapted upon doing experiments that require bulk amount of solvents, high temperatures, and pressures... I have to say that I learned a lot from this training and it helped me figure why previous experiments failed.

"This internship showed me the difference between working in big research group which differ drastically from the work environment in medium-sized research groups that I'm currently part of at McGill. This was totally significant especially that I'm thinking of doing my postdoctoral studies abroad."

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Hiba Zerrougui

Political Science

"I accessed more than 35 000 pages worth of documents created by the consular services and the State Department and identified hundreds of relevant files on the postcolonial political dynamics in Algeria. These records (recently declassified by American authorities) are of great value for my dissertation research on contentious politics in authoritarian settings... I now have access to accounts made by members of the Algerian government on the political situation in their country in addition to the American perspectives.

"I also learned how to conduct archival research under the guidance of very helpful and knowledgeable archivists of the National Archives, a type of technical knowledge that is not usually taught in graduate seminars."

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Jamal Jason Archer

Family Medicine

"This experience was informative and exciting. My knowledge of Bioethics and how it relates to my thesis has broadened. My views on justice and injustice have taken on a more in-depth understanding...

"The program included special tours at Yale museums, the Cushing Center’s collection of brain specimens, and Yale’s Medical Historical Library... At the library, I reviewed photos, letters, and artifacts of injured WW1 soldiers who were patients in army based hospital wards. I also reviewed the letters, paintings, and notes of children of war, female inmates, and patients suffering from HIV. This experience provided an intimate look at the ways injustice paralyzed the most vulnerable... I enjoyed the visit to the Connecticut Hospice, which is the nation’s first hospice. After this experience, I decided I want to work closely with patients who were dying... I am truly appreciative that I received funding and was thus able to attend this splendid summer program."

 

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Laurence Gagnon

Experimental Medicine

"A powerful tool to investigate structural dynamics of ligand-GPCR complexes involves bioorthogonal labeling via site-specific incorporation of unnatural amino acids (UAAs) into proteins using the amber codon suppression technology... This approach has been developed in Dr. Thomas P. Sakmar laboratory at the Rockefeller University (NYC) and successfully used to trap the receptor-ligand complex and give information about binding-sites of many GPCRs.

"I visited his lab to learn the technique and I used all the state-of-the-art equipment to conduct successful research in this area... The knowledge that I gained contribute towards the completion of my thesis and I will also be able to implant this innovative technology in my laboratory and all other lab members will benefit from it.

"Thank you very much for this wonderful opportunity. I highly recommend other students to do internships abroad, it certainly help for the our thesis and makes us grow as scientists. Science is all about collaboration."

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Melanie Doucet

Social Work

"I was able to take a tour of the School of Social Policy & Practice and The Field Center for Children’s Policy, Practice & Research at University of Pennsylvania, and meet with Dr. Greeson in person to discuss our collaboration on a systematic review that we will be submitting for peer-reviewed publication... It was my first time visiting Philadelphia, and hopefully if all goes well not my last!"

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Michalis Kassinopoulos

Biomedical Engineering

"The Graduate Mobility Award gave me the opportunity to attend the NeuroHackademy which is an annual summer institute in neuroimaging and data science held at the University of Washington eScience Institute... 

"This intensive and interactive training course helped me to develop my computational skills allowing me to analyze large neuroscience datasets in an efficient manner, and also taught me how to use machine learning tools in the context of neuroimaging... Last, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to the Government of Quebec and McGill University for providing me this mobility opportunity as it allowed me to attend this training course, in the beautiful city of Seattle, and gain a lot of experience."

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Patrick Kilfoil

Urban Planning

"The goal of the trip was to conduct fieldwork in Philadelphia, which included interviews with key informants and site visits. The data collected will prove extremely important in developing the analysis for my dissertation. The experience gained in organizing and conducting a large number of interviews in a relatively small time frame will also be quite important moving forward in my career as a social science researcher."

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Peter Tikasz

Bioresource Engineering

"A few years ago, Polar Eggs (under Choice North Farms) decided to build a two-floor shed to provide vegetables and meat for remote communities in Canada. 
"My objective was to build a bioreactor to partially substitute the fertilizer with chicken manure. Before my trip, I built a prototype to measure nutrients (NH4, NO3, K, Ca and Na) in the bioreactor with the help of Ion Selective Electrodes. I completed some experiments by adding concrete blocks to the manure solution to increase some of the nutrient content. Once on site, I assisted Glenn Scott, the main researcher, to set up a datalogger and bioreactor. I learned how a Campbell Scientific datalogger was working, about northern agriculture and challenges of remote communities. I plan to return for a second trip to complete the bioreactor mid-August."

 

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Samantha Carruthers

Earth and Planetary Science

"Having the opportunity to work closely with Prof. Sean Mulcahy was an invaluable experience and research opportunity for me. I feel as though my current project has progressed greatly as a result of working with and learning from Prof. Mulcahy. He taught me how to use a very useful software program that will allow me to advance my research and will play a critical role in understanding the deformation history of Heart Rock, my main research topic...

"Thank you for the opportunity, I am very grateful for the time I was able to spend with Prof. Mulcahy as a result of this Graduate Mobility Award."

 

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Sripad Joshi

Plant Science

"I travelled to University of Minnesota to learn the Gemnivirus based plant gene editing by CRISPR-Cas9. One of my PhD objective involves using this technique. Hence the learning process also helped me to develop some of the required plasmids for my PhD study. We are collaborating with the host lab and trying to come up with new projects.

"University of Minnesota is a leading University in agricultural science and hence the overall experience was fantastic and a great learning experience."

"PhD is stressful journey, and it has been the same for past couple of years. You tend to lose interest in research if you spend more time in the same lab. Hence this was a nice experience to regain my interest and focus in research and my job."

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Willow White

English

"I conducted archival research at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University (New Haven, US). I accomplished my primary research goal: to analyze and transcribe an unpublished and previously unrecorded manuscript of Frances Burney. The manuscript is dated c. 1779, the same year that Burney was writing her first play which she eventually abandoned at the recommendation of her father. This manuscript sheds new light on Burney’s development as a dramatist. In it, she adapts scenes from Arthur Murphy's 1761 play "All in the Wrong" She alters the dialogue in all the scenes between Lady Restless and her maidservant Tattle. This manuscript will play an important part in my Compulsory Research Project, and in a chapter of my dissertation on Frances Burney and comedy."

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Yvonne Goh

School of Human Nutrition

"The WHO/COCHRANE/CORNELL training on systematic reviews on nutrition for global policy making brought together experts to teach participants how to carry out reviews using the highest standards available. I have learned how to

1) plan and write up a protocol for a systematic review

2) write an effective search strategy in pubmed

3) carry out searches in databases

4) screen articles for eligibility in Covidence

5) develop a data extraction form and enter data into revman and

6) use revman to write up my review and carry out a meta-analysis if possible."

"I have been also been given access to several resources including the Cornell library resources and Covidence for a period of one year. The many opportunities provided by the workshop for networking have helped me to improve my skills and feel more confident about approaching experts and asking questions.

"I am extremely grateful for this wonderful experience!"

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