Professor Doug Crawford’s work on vision/movement connection earns Tier 1 CRC
TORONTO, May 23, 2007 -- York University Professor Doug Crawford has been awarded a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Visual-Motor Neuroscience, a federal government commitment which will enable Crawford to greatly expand his research into how our brains transform visual information into action.
Maxime Bernier, Minister of Industry and Minister responsible for the Canada Research Chairs Program, announced the Tier 1 Chair for Crawford today, part of an $83.7-million investment in Canada Research Chairs across the country. This includes $10.4 million in infrastructure funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation.
“Our newly released science and technology strategy – Mobilizing Science and Technology to Canada’s Advantage – recognizes the importance of doing more to turn ideas into innovations that provide solutions to our environment, health and other important challenges, and to improve Canada’s economic competitiveness,” said Bernier. “We are investing in promising researchers who turn ideas and innovations into practical and commercial applications for the benefit of all Canadians.”
As a Tier 2 CRC since 2001, Crawford, a professor of psychology and member of York’s pioneering Centre for Vision Research, has used measurements of eye, head, and arm movements, computer simulations and recordings of brain activity to learn how we see an object, remember where it is, and reach out to grasp it. The Tier 1 CRC award of $200,000 per year for seven years and CFI infrastructure award of $203,584 for laboratory upgrades and equipment will be used to expand upon this research, which holds significant promise for treatment of medical conditions such as stroke and for development of prosthetic devices to duplicate human visual and motor function.
Crawford’s research team has developed computational models for 3-D eye and head movement and spatial memory across these movements, and completed the first model of the 3-D visuomotor transformations for visually guided arm movements. Recently, they used brain imaging technology to pinpoint the key place in the brain where visual perception stops and control of movement begins – findings they are putting to work in a clinical setting to help rehabilitate stroke patients.
“Like reverse-engineers, we are asking what it is that one would need to know in order to build a brain that sees and moves,” said Crawford. “The ultimate goal of all of our projects is to develop an accurate computational model that describes all of the behaviours and mechanisms involved in vision and movement, to incorporate all of the main signals used by the brain in doing this, and to predict the clinical consequences of damage to the brain.”
Stan Shapson, vice-president research & innovation at York, said government investments into university research are crucial to sustaining York’s globally competitive research programs and to retaining the world’s best researchers. “The advancement of Professor Crawford into a position as a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair once again recognizes the excellence of his research through international peer review,” said Shapson. “It also builds on York’s renowned centre of excellence in vision research, enhancing our ability to undertake leading-edge, interdisciplinary health-science research.”
York University is the leading interdisciplinary research and teaching university in Canada. York offers a modern, academic experience at the undergraduate and graduate level in Toronto, Canada’s most international city. The third largest university in the country, York is host to a dynamic academic community of 50,000 students and 7,000 faculty and staff, as well as 190,000 alumni worldwide. York’s 11 faculties and 24 research centres conduct ambitious, groundbreaking research that is interdisciplinary, cutting across traditional academic boundaries. This distinctive and collaborative approach is preparing students for the future and bringing fresh insights and solutions to real-world challenges. York University is an autonomous, not-for-profit corporation.
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Media contact:
Janice Walls, Media Relations, York University, 416-736-2100 x22101/ wallsj@yorku.ca
