I am pleased to announce that the Governing Council has approved the appointment of Professor Edward (Ted) Sargent as Vice-President, International for a five-year term effective July 1, 2016 and continuing until June 30, 2021. The position profile for the newly created position of Vice-President, International is available here.

Ted Sargent received a B.Sc.Eng. (Engineering Physics) from Queen’s University in 1995 and a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering (Photonics) from the University of Toronto in 1998.

Professor Sargent joined the Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Toronto in 1998, was promoted to Associate Professor in 2002, and to Full Professor in 2005. He served as Associate Chair, Research, for Electrical and Computer Engineering, from 2009 to 2012. He currently serves as the Vice-Dean, Research, for the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering (FASE) and holds the Canada Research Chair in Nanotechnology. In 2015, he was appointed as University Professor, the University of Toronto’s most distinguished rank.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada; a Fellow of the AAAS “…for distinguished contributions to the development of solar cells and light sensors based on solution-processed semiconductors;” and a Fellow of the IEEE “… for contributions to colloidal quantum dot optoelectronic devices.” He is Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Engineering for “…ground-breaking research in nanotechnology, applying novel quantum-tuned materials to the realization of full-spectrum solar cells and ultra sensitive light detectors.” The impact of his work has been felt in industry through his formation of two start-up companies; he is founder and CTO of InVisage Technologies and a co-founder of Xagenic.

Professor Sargent’s research interests cover many areas of nanotechnology and its application to communications and computing, medicine, and tapping new energy sources. His research has been cited more than 16,000 times and has been disseminated in Nature, Science, Nature Materials, Nature Nanotechnology, Nature Chemistry, and Nature Photonics. His book, The Dance of Molecules: How Nanotechnology is Changing Our Lives (Penguin), was published in Canada and the United States in 2005 and has been translated into French, Spanish, Italian, Korean, and Arabic.

Through his work both as a scholar and Vice-Dean, Research in FASE, Professor Sargent has accumulated extensive experience in developing and enhancing global research networks involving both academic and industrial partners. I look forward to having Professor Sargent join the vice-presidential team. Please join me in congratulating him on his appointment.