Vikramaditya G. Yadav

As an undergraduate student in chemical engineering at the University of Waterloo, Vikramaditya G. Yadav coveted a career in Alberta’s burgeoning petrochemical sector. One evening during his second year, he stumbled upon a copy of Juan Enríquez’s ‘As the Future Catches You’ in the library and was instantly captivated by biological engineering. “My new found passion took me on a wonderful journey that included stops at Sanofi Pasteur and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where I received my doctoral degree for a thesis on engineering enzymes and bacteria for synthesis of pharmaceuticals,” says Vikramaditya. Now, as an Assistant Professor at the University of British Columbia, he is conducting wide-ranging research in metagenomics, bioenergy, water bioremediation, drug discovery and manufacturing, phytochemistry and Alzheimer’s disease.