At the April 4 event: award winners Kristie Irving, Will Oud and Doug Spooner; director of athletics Bob Copeland and associate director Beth Ali; award winners Lisa Kelly and Jamie Hauseman.

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Warriors spiffed up for year-end awards

a news release from the department of athletics and recreational services

The Waterloo Warriors’ 2008-09 interuniversity athletics season officially came to a close on Saturday night, April 4, with the 49th annual Athletics Awards Banquet. The evening was a rousing success as nearly 600 student athletes came out to celebrate the achievements of another season.

The highlights of the night included the announcement of the Male and Female Athletes of the Year.

The Totzke Trophy for the Warrior Male Athlete of the Year went to squash sensation Eric Dingle, a fifth-year computer engineering student from Calgary, who managed to combine a 93 per cent academic average with an impressive list of accomplishments on the court. He completed his third consecutive undefeated season in 2008-09, earning him a spot as an OUA first-team All-Star (fifth straight year) and OUA Most Valuable Player honours (third straight year). Many of his victories came in convincing fashion, including a near-perfect 9-1, 9-0, 9-0 win in the OUA Sectionals. Dingle put the finishing touches on his incredible season with a silver medal at the Canadian University and College Championships.

The Marsden Trophy for the Warrior Female Athlete of the Year went to golf phenom Tiffany Terrier. A third-year mechanical engineering student from Toronto, she medaled in every event she entered in 2008, including gold at the Windsor Invitational and silver at the OUA Championships. Her fine play led the Warriors’ female golfers to five team medals, including silver at the OUA championships. Terrier’s incredible season on the course landed her a spot on the OUA’s first All-Star Team.

Both Dingle and Terrier received an emotional surprise following the award presentations when their parents emerged from a back corner of the banquet hall. His mother and father had flown in from Calgary and her mother and father travelled from their home in Jamaica to share in the achievement.

The Warriors’ Male Rookie of the Year award went to first-year political science student Jordan Verdone. He made an immediate impact on the Warrior football team last fall, finishing second in the OUA and sixth in the CIS in total tackles. His tremendous season at the linebacker position earned him OUA and CIS Rookie of the Year honours for football, a first for a Warrior football player.

Female Rookie of the Year went to first-year honours science student Julia Endicott, a defensive star on the Warrior hockey team. She played significant minutes in all situations, earning her CIS All-Rookie Team recognition.

Chris Erven, coach of the Warrior badminton team, received the Imprint Coach of the Year Award after leading his team to an OUA silver medal. Under Erven’s tutelage, Andrew Tai-Pow won the OUA’s Player of the Year Award and Evan MacDonald won the OUA’s Rookie of the Year Award.

Will Oud, Doug Spooner, Jamie Hauseman, Kirstie Irving and Lisa Kelly were the recipients of the John O. Hemphill Award (for male athletes) and Director's Award (for female athletes) recognizing a “significant administrative contribution” to Warrior athletics.

The Brian Farrance Award for the year’s top student therapist went to Ashley Chapman.

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Three new CFI grants for UW research

a news release from the UW media relations office

Waterloo researchers have received funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation to perform work in body composition and cancer, diversity of microorganisms and the use of digital media technologies.

The UW researchers have been awarded grants totalling $386,099 for three projects in the latest cross-country funding announcement by the CFI, an independent federal government corporation. The money comes from CFI's leaders opportunity fund, which assists universities in attracting and retaining top faculty.

"These vital investments at Waterloo will help ensure that our researchers and their students have access to advanced research facilities," said George Dixon, UW's vice-president (university research). UW's winning projects and researchers involved are as follows:

• Evaluation of body composition in health and disease. CFI funding: $56,232. Principal investigator: Marina Mourtzakis, kinesiology. A high precision tool, called a dual-energy X-ray absorptiometer (DXA), will allow Mourtzakis to measure body composition and track tissue changes accurately in cancer patients.

"The CFI-funded DXA is fundamental in advancing my research to evaluate the interrelationships between body composition, nutrition, exercise and metabolism in cancer," Mourtzakis said. "Unfavourable changes in body composition develop during the cancer trajectory and these changes are linked to poor metabolic outcomes that increase the risk of cancer recurrence, cardiovascular disease and diabetes in cancer survivors." The DXA will allow her research team to precisely characterize body composition in cancer patients as well as to evaluate the efficacy of nutrition and exercise programs used to counter these body composition changes in cancer patients.

• Integrated facility for assessing microbial community diversity and function. CFI funding: $150,000. Principal investigator: Josh Neufeld, biology. The CFI money will be used to set up a state-of-the-art facility for microbial ecology research, spurring collaborative research with scientists at UW and other universities. At the facility, researchers can design and implement advanced molecular methods to describe and compare environmental and human-associated microbial communities.

"The extreme diversity of most microbial communities and the challenge of culturing microbial life have limited attempts by microbiologists to characterize these organisms and understand their metabolic roles in the environment," Neufeld said. "In our research, we seek to assess microbial diversity and composition as it relates to environmental parameters, and identify active organisms and novel enzymes associated with biogeochemical cycling of carbon and nitrogen in a range of habitats."

• Visualization and biotelematics environment. CFI funding: $179,867. Principal investigators: Marcel O'Gorman, English language and literature, and Colin Ellard, psychology. The CFI-funded infrastructure enables O'Gorman and Ellard to advance collaborative research projects using mobile media, biometrics and visualization technologies.

Both researchers probe the interaction of the body with new technologies, especially the relationship between digital visualization techniques, physical mobility, and physical and mental health. Their work explores the impact of digital media on culture, society and the human condition.

CAR

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