Canada Research Chair Tier II in Fire Behaviour and Management - Assistant Professor​/Associate Professor

Thompson Rivers University (TRU) invites applications for a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair (CRC), tenure-track or tenured position at the rank of assistant or associate professor, in the area of Fire Behaviour and Management.

The Government of Canada has established the CRC program as a means of enabling Canadian universities to sustain leading edge research excellence. TRU is committed to advancing wildfire science and training, with wildfire activity across Canada increasing and leading to profound societal and health impacts. The combination of more frequent extreme weather and longer fire seasons is causing larger wildfires and, at times, very intense fire activity.

This increase in wildfire activity creates challenges for agencies and resources charged with fire suppression and management. The impacts of escalating wildfire behaviour, and related fire management challenges, have been especially felt in interior British Columbia (BC), the region that TRU and its partners in the Interior Universities Research Coalition (UNBC and UBCO) serve.

The proposed CRC aligns with two of TRU’s institutional research priorities: understanding and responding to climate change, and contributing to greater social cohesion and sense of belonging through a commitment to social justice and equity. TRU is addressing the new reality of more extreme fire behaviour through a unique partnership with the BC Wildfire Service (BCWS). Supported by the Province of BC, TRU Wildfire offers a solutions-focused and comprehensive approach to current and future wildfire challenges, bringing together and linking research, education, training and innovation under one umbrella.

In 2023, the Institute for Wildfire Science, Adaptation and Resiliency was formed at TRU to conduct groundbreaking research and innovation to generate new knowledge and contribute solutions to adapt to the new reality of wildfire.

This new CRC in Fire Behaviour and Management will join the Institute, and the Department of Natural Resource Sciences, alongside other wildfire-focused faculty. To complement existing research strengths in fire-weather, wildfire prediction, fire ecology, ecosystem reclamation, and ecological modelling, the CRC’s proposed scientific research program should focus on one or more of the following areas:

 Fire behaviour modelling using empirical or semi-empirical models or physics-based models
 Fuel management and modelling
 Fire occurrence prediction (human- and/or lightning-caused)
 Experimental burning in laboratory or field-based settings
 Innovative and integrated fire management strategies
 Operational wildfire fighter response and suppression effectiveness
 Remote sensing to advance fire science, monitoring and management

TRU’s Faculty of Science boasts a distinguished history of excellent teaching and world-class research. It produces graduates who are knowledgeable and skilled problem solvers, and who carry out research that is important to the environment and sustainability. It offers a wide array of undergraduate certificate, diploma, and degree programs in pure and applied sciences, including Bachelor’s degrees in fields related to this position such as Natural Resource Sciences and Ecology and Environmental Biology.

The Faculty also offers graduate programs at the Master’s level: the Chair will have opportunity to supervise research students in the MSc in Environmental Science and the MSc in Data Science. Starting in September 2025, TRU will offer three new 3-course certificates in Wildfire Science and Studies.

The CRC in Fire Behaviour and Management will have significant opportunities for collaborative research with other Chairs at TRU including the BC Innovation Research Chair in Predictive Services, Emergency Management and Fire Science, CRC in Fire Ecology, CRC in Economics of Climate Change, Disasters, and Inequality, CRC in Rural Livelihoods and Sustainable Communities, and NSERC Industrial Research Chair in Ecosystem Reclamation.

There is also opportunity for interdisciplinary collaboration among other departments, TRU Faculties and research groups including scholars in the fields of Data Science, Computer…