HAMILTON - Canada Research Chairs announcement yesterday brought good news to McMaster University. Gianluigi Botton advanced to tier one standing, and Antoine Deza, Brian Golding, and Thia Kirubarajan were renewed as Canada Research Chairs for a second term.

Botton, professor of materials science and engineering, is Canada Research Chair in Electron Microscopy of Nanoscale Materials. His research involves examination of the composition, structure and bonding of nanostructured materials using advanced microscopy and spectroscopy. He was first named a Canada Research Chair in 2002. (http://mse.mcmaster.ca/faculty_staff/faculty/botton)

Deza, professor of computing and software, is Canada Research Chair in Combinatorial Optimization. His research involves combining theoretical and computational approaches to generate algorithms. He was first named a Canada Research Chair (Tier 2) in 2004. (http://www.cas.mcmaster.ca/~deza)

Golding, professor of biology, is Canada Research Chair in Bioinformatics. His research involves exploration of the nature of the changes observed between molecules, between genes and between genomes. He was first named a Canada Research Chair (Tier 1) in 2002. (http://helix.biology.mcmaster.ca)

Kirubarajan, professor of electrical and computer engineering, is Canada Research Chair in Information Fusion. His research involves developing advanced multi-source information fusion algorithms for large-scale systems. He was first named a Canada Research Chair (Tier 2) in 2004. (http://www.ece.mcmaster.ca/~kiruba)

Tier 1 Chairs, tenable for seven years and renewable, are for outstanding researchers acknowledged by their peers as world leaders in their fields. For each Tier 1 Chair, the university receives $200,000 annually for seven years.

Tier 2 Chairs, tenable for five years and renewable once, are for exceptional emerging researchers, acknowledged by their peers as having the potential to lead in their field. For each Tier 2 Chair, the university receives $100,000 annually for five years.

The Canada Research Chairs Program, launched in 2000, is designed to attract the best talent from Canada and around the world, helping Canadian universities achieve research excellence in health sciences, natural sciences and engineering, and social sciences and humanities. (www.chairs-chaires.gc.ca)