Professor Profiles – Ka Yin Leung
MH: What work consumes your time outside of class?
Photo credit: twu.ca
My goal is to move the science faculty forward, and to provide a conducive environment for my colleagues to do more research.
In the last three years my mandate has been to increase the intensity of the research and also to help to facilitate the development of our infrastructure. That’s why the new science wing that was just built will help to provide enough lab space for research. This will also be compliant to the Canadian Tri-Council standards for research labs such as safety and biosecurity.
Apart from infrastructure, I would also like to see my colleagues having more time and freedom to pursue more funding and grants in order to assemble the manpower for research through graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and technicians.
I think this is important for the science faculty and also for Trinity Western University so that we can be comparable to any science faculty in Canada, in North America, or anywhere in the world. Our aspiration is to be a world class Christian University as stated and envisioned by President Raymond.
Because I spend most of my time doing administrative and teaching, my personal research has been somewhat scaled down.
In the past 14 years as a principal investigator in the National University of Singapore, I had a sizeable group of about ten researchers to work on bacteria research. I have been studying protein secretion systems in food and water borne bacteria. I tried to understand what are the proteins and also the DNA of the genes that cause diseases in both animals and human beings. It is an attempt to understand the interaction between the host and the bacteria.
MH: What is your vision and passion for the coming year?
Right now I am teaching medical microbiology and it is such an excitement because I can talk about my research to my students in hope that that will stimulate their excitement in microbiology.
At at the same time, [in my administrative role] we have a strategic plan that began in my first year that sets the vision for what the faculty will look like in five or ten years down the road. The one thing I look forward to is how the faculty of science will grow over that period. Not just the infrastructures but also in seeing the culture grow – to see our faculty become stronger.
Research in particular is one very important component of this plan for me, but this will require further growth and more fundraising. Our goal is to be excellent teachers for our students and also excellent scholars in our field. At the end, our students will have a great education experience and our God’s name will be glorified.
Michael Biornstad
Recent Comments