The Vice-President (Research), Dr. Christopher Loomis, is responsible for promoting and enhancing the university's broad range of research activities. His specific priorities for research at Memorial include:

• supporting research across all academic disciplines and ranging from fundamental to applied research;
• building partnerships with other universities, research organizations and industry in Canada and elsewhere;
• attracting more research funds to Memorial and other research organizations in the province;
• enhancing the dissemination, application and commercialization of research results generated at Memorial.

Biography

Dr. Christopher Loomis received his PhD from Queen's University in 1983, where he served as assistant professor in the Departments of Pharmacology & Toxicology, and Anesthesia until 1987. He joined the School of Pharmacy of Memorial University as an associate professor in 1988, was appointed full professor in 1996, and became director of the School in 1998. He was appointed Vice-President (Research) of Memorial University in 2002, and renewed for a second term in 2007. He has also served as Vice-President (Academic) Pro Tempore, and President and Vice-Chancellor Pro Tempore of Memorial University.

Dr. Loomis' program of research, funded primarily by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), formerly the Medical Research Council of Canada (MRC), has focused on the spinal pharmacology of pain, opioid and non-opioid mechanisms of spinal analgesia, and central mechanisms of neuropathic pain early after nerve injury. He is the author of many papers and presentations on these subjects.

Dr. Loomis is currently a member of the Governing Council of the CIHR, and sits on the Board of Directors of Canarie (Canada's Advanced Research and Innovation Network). He is a former member and officer of several MRC/CIHR peer review committees, and served as Memorial's first MRC regional director. He is also a past member of the Advisory Council of the Rx&D Health Research Foundation, and the Panel of Examiners of the Pharmacy Examining Board of Canada.

Dr. Loomis twice received the Bristol Myers-Squibb Award for Excellence in Pharmaceutical Teaching, and the Dr. Albert R. Cox Research Award for outstanding research from Memorial University.