Laurentian University 1st in attracting research funds

It's good to be number one.

It's a ranking that Laurentian University in Sudbury can boast about when it comes to research.

Laurentian has recently been named number one in research income and growth for undergraduate universities by Research Infosource.

Every year the consulting and publishing firm ranks schools based on different research categories and criteria.

Rizwan Haq is the interim vice-president of research at the university.

"Everybody is excited about this," said Haq. "This is something that has come about because of all the hard work and effort that the faculty, the staff, and the students have put in, and it's something to celebrate."

In 2018, the school saw more than $44 million in research income.

Haq says the research income comes from different sources, and most of what Research Infosource looks at is Tri-Council funding, which is from the government in the fields of science and engineering, health research, and the social sciences and humanities.

He says the university also receives research dollars from the corporate world and cites mining and mineral exploration as an example.

"There are so many mining industries here, there is a sizeable contribution from our mining partners," said Haq.

Laurentian was also ranked number one in research income growth with a 37.2 per cent growth between 2017 and 2018.

Haq attributes the increase to the fact that staff, students, and faculty are so excited about research.

"The growth is because of the excellent ideas that we have for doing the research--and not only us, but the funding agencies believe that these are ideas that need to be explored, need to be researched, and funding should be provided," he explained.

Some of what Haq described as Laurentian's multi-million-dollar research include the Metal Earth project and the astroparticle physics project in partnership with the McDonald Institute at Queen's University.

Haq says that the research rankings make Laurentian University very attractive to faculty and staff. "The future of research at Laurentian is very bright," he added.

Laurentian came in 27th in the overall rankings of the top 50 research universities in Canada.