June 20, 2016 [TORONTO] The Fields Institute is pleased to announce that they have partnered with Mitacs to provide funding and training for graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. This partnership will assist in the recruitment of high-caliber, qualified graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, while bringing together research collaborations between academia and industry.

The terms of this project will make the Fields Institute a major player in the submission process for funding concerning collaboration with industry research partners. Mitacs will coordinate the review and acceptance of up to 10 applications this year, increasing every year for three years.

This collaboration will be facilitated through Mitacs Accelerate, a program which grants students minimum four month internships with an industry or non-profit partner to carry out their research. Mitacs will be assisted by Fields for the selection of researchers at partner institutes and other academic or industry organizations. Over the past 16 years, Mitacs programs have supported more than 10,000 research internships, trained more than 19,000 student and postdoc career-skills participants, and supported more than 1,300 international research collaborations.. It is these statistics that Fields saw Mitacs as such an important player to the Institute's initiatives with mathematics in industry, and cultivating these ideas further.

The collaboration between mathematics research and industry is a key initiative at Fields, and it is this partnership that is key to the growth of Fields development of industrial research in mathematics. Associate Director for Industrial Liaison Huaxiong Huang stated that, "this agreement marks the beginning of a new and mutually-beneficial relationship between Fields and Mitacs. Its impact will be felt throughout the entire commercial and industrial mathematics program at Fields. I truly look forward to many successful outcomes through bringing together Mitacs and our community of mathematical scientists."

After this agreement was made, Fields Director Ian Hambleton stated that Fields “welcomes this partnership between Fields and Mitacs, and we look forward to opening up new opportunities for graduate students, postdocs, and faculty at our sponsoring universities to engage with industry. Mathematical tools are becoming increasingly important in a wide variety of applications, and Fields is enthusiastic about expanding our role in this area."

About Mitacs

Mitacs is a national, not-for-profit organization that has designed and delivered research and training programs in Canada for 16 years. Working with 60 universities, thousands of companies, and both federal and provincial governments, Mitacs builds partnerships that support industrial and social innovation in Canada.

Mitacs’ research internship program connects graduate students with industry and not-for-profit partners for collaborations supervised by faculty. Open to all disciplines and all industry sectors, projects can span a wide range of areas, including manufacturing, business processes, IT, design, and more.

About the Fields Institute

Founded in 1992, the Fields Institute is a leading international research centre located on the campus of the University of Toronto.

The mission of the Institute is to enhance mathematical activity in Canada by bringing together mathematicians from Canada and abroad, and by promoting contact and collaboration between professional mathematicians and the increasing numbers of users of mathematics. Thus the Institute supports research in pure and applied mathematics, statistics and computer science, as well as collaboration between mathematicians and those applying mathematics in areas such as engineering, the physical and biological sciences, medicine, economics and finance, telecommunications and information systems.

Every year, its programs attract more than 4000 participants from around the world. The Institute is supported by the Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the National Science Foundation (US), and a growing list of partner universities and corporations in Canada, the United States, and Europe.