UBC’s Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) team was awarded the Brockhouse Canada Prize for Interdisciplinary Research in Science and Engineering last week.
The award is funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and serves to recognize Canadian excellence in projects that combine expertise across multiple disciplines.
According to CHIME project members, the significance of this award is not limited to its financial potential — the real value lies in community, validation and new opportunities to explore the unknown.
The main goal of CHIME is to learn more about the expansion of the Universe by characterizing dark energy. The project is also a leader in the observation of mysterious radio waves coming from outside our galaxy called fast radio bursts and also does research on pulsars, neutron stars with very strong magnetic fields.
The CHIME team — composed of around a hundred students, faculty and staff — collaborate closely in their exploration of the Universe and its constituents.
According to physics and astronomy professor and CHIME member Dr. Mark Halpern, the major significance lies in the honour of being recognized with a national award of this scale.
He said he felt the excitement surrounding this award was rooted in “having the recognition and the appreciation that we actually built something that’s useful and productive.”
The community aspect was also highlighted by the CHIME members interviewed. Physics and astronomy professor and CHIME member Dr. Ingrid Stairs stressed that this award belongs to the whole CHIME team.
“There is a huge amount of effort that’s gone into [the CHIME project] by a very large number of people and it really should be considered to be a full team award,” she said.
The interdisciplinary nature of the Brockhouse Prize finds a perfect home in the CHIME project. The team consists of engineers, programmers, cosmologists, radio astronomists and more.
The team-centred approach to CHIME was apparent when The Ubyssey interviewed Halpern’s lab, including PhD student Tristan Pinsonneault-Marotte, posstdoctoral fellow Hyoyin Gan, scientific software developer Liam Gray and CHIME project manager Mandana Amiri. According to Amiri, the CHIME project finds a “good balance” in its team.
Pinsonneault-Marotte has found CHIME to be a significant learning opportunity as he completed his Master’s on the project and wraps up his PhD.
“It’s a great mix of people from different backgrounds … it’s been a great opportunity to learn from people.”
As the CHIME members accept this honour, professor of physics and astronomy and CHIME member Dr. Gary Hinshaw explained, the Brockhouse Prize extends to an affirmation of having a “pan-Canadian” project provide exceptional research contributions.
“It’s a specifically Canadian born and bred project that has gone beyond the borders … that sense of cooperation and mission focus is really wonderful,” he said.