The Connaught Fund at the University of Toronto awarded Derek Ng a $20,000 Connaught New Researcher Award. Ng, who holds a PhD in molecular structural biology and is an assistant professor in the Biomedical Communications program, will use the award to fund his research into biomolecular visualization.
Dr. Derek Ng, assistant professor of biomedical communications, is a 2020 recipient of the prestigious Connaught New Researcher Award.
Ng says that due to rapid technological advances in molecular structural biology and bioinformatics, research scientists generate and have access to vast amounts of biomolecular data.
"Integrating, exploring, and extracting meaning from this great quantity and diversity of data is the challenge," he says.
With the Connaught New Researcher Award, Ng says that he will be able to study the role of visualization in the analytical processes, methods, and tools that molecular biologists currently use. Findings from this study will inform the creation of an evidence-based framework that can be used to guide the design and evaluation of future visual analytic tools to better support knowledge discovery in molecular structural biology.