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Creating opportunities at the Centre for Oil and Gas Research and Development
Image of some of the instruments at COGRAD used to measure petroleum-based chemicals in the environment. Funding for the Centre was from Western Economic Diversification Canada (now Prairies Economic Development Canada).
The Centre for Oil and Gas Research and Development (COGRAD), located in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Manitoba, is an analytical facility committed to advancing the analyses and remediation of petroleum-based chemicals in the environment. Founded in 2015 through funding from the Western Economic Diversification Canada (now Prairies Economic Development Canada, PrairiesCan), the Centre is an International Organization for Standardization (ISO) accredited analytical laboratory. Because of the ISO-17025 accreditation, the Centre provides scientifically defensible analytical data to external clients. The Centre houses state-of-the-art analytical instrumentation used primarily to develop faster and more cost-efficient analytical means of measuring petroleum-based compounds, development of tools to delineate sources of crude-oil exposures, design of innovation strategies to remediate and monitor crude-oil components and forensic fingerprinting studies leading to new areas of environmental research. The Centre works closely with industry and/or government organizations to help support their environmental monitoring obligations.
The Centre recently augmented its operations to include research and development in the field of environmental DNA (eDNA). The technique relies on the use of molecular methods to measure cellular material shed by organisms into aquatic and terrestrial environments. With this approach, rapid, non-invasive screening tools, complementary to traditional visual taxonomy, can be used to monitor ecosystem biodiversity.
Strategically situated at the University of Manitoba, the Centre attracts graduate and undergraduate students keen to conduct research in the field of oil & gas science. Student-led research at COGRAD encompass study areas of environmental analytical chemistry, ecotoxicology, biochemistry, eDNA, with hands on training on the use of state-of-the-art instrumentation. Our research team encourages both dependent and independent learning and the diversity of skills that are transferred to students and the unique ability to work in an ISO-accredited facility ensures that they are well equipped for the workplace.
The Centre collaborates with scientists from Environment and Climate Change Canada on many student-led research projects at the master’s and PhD level focused on the general theme of understanding impacts and distribution of petroleum-based chemicals in the Canadian environment. We also have a longstanding collaboration with members of the Kivalliq Inuit Association (KIA) with a vision to combine traditional knowledge with western science to enhance protocols of field-based water sampling for eDNA analysis.
For further information please visit our website: http://cogradmb.ca or contact Gregg Tomy (Gregg.tomy@umanitoba.ca) or Jorg Stetefeld (jorg.stetefeld@umanitoba.ca). v
