Science researcher receives New Frontiers in Research funding

Will Percival from the Department of Physics and Astronomy, Faculty of Science has received funding from the Government of Canada’s New Frontiers in Research Fund (NFRF).

The project was part of two competitions: the 2021 Exploration competition and the NFRF special call on Innovative Approaches to Research in the Pandemic Context.

Percival is the Director of the Waterloo Centre of Astrophysics and focuses his research on the properties of the Universe on the largest scales. He was recognized in the special call for innovative approaches to research in the pandemic context and received $250,000 for the proposal "Being confident in the discovery of new physics from cosmological observations" in collaboration with Professor Glen McGee from the Faculty of Math. The project goals are to apply techniques developed for biostatistics to the problem of understanding the Universe as a whole. 

"Some recent astrophysical observations are in tension with the standard cosmological model, possibly pointing to unknown physical processes at work in the Universe. A small interdisciplinary team at Waterloo will look at the statistical strength of these claims."

The NFRF awarded more than $45 million in support for research projects for 751 researchers, including 245 early career researchers. Research teams of two or more are receiving grants of up to $250,000 each over two years.

There were six recipients in total from the University of Waterloo.