page_title: University of Western Ontario
section_title: Research
hierarchical_section_title: University of Western Ontario / Academics / Research
caption_attribution_description: English: Main Entrance of Robarts Research Institute, London, Ontario, Canada.
context_page_description: The University of Western Ontario, corporately branded as Western University as of 2012 and commonly shortened to Western, is a public research university in London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on 455 hectares of land, surrounded by residential neighbourhoods and the Thames River bisecting the campus's eastern portion. The university operates twelve academic faculties and schools. It is a member of the U15, a group of research-intensive universities in Canada.
  The university was founded on 7 March 1878 by Bishop Isaac Hellmuth of the Anglican Diocese of Huron as The Western University of London, Ontario. It incorporated Huron College, which had been founded in 1863. The first four faculties were Arts, Divinity, Law and Medicine. The university became non-denominational in 1908. Beginning in 1919, the university had affiliated with several denominational colleges. The university grew substantially in the post-World War II era, and a number of faculties and schools were added.
  Western is a co-educational university, with more than 24,000 students, and over 306,000 living alumni worldwide.
context_section_description: Western has four primary fields of research: life sciences and the human condition, culture analysis and values, the human and physical environments, and social trends, public policy, and economic activity. In Research Infosource's 2018 ranking of Canadian research universities, Western was ranked 10th; with a sponsored research income (external funding) of $249.669 million in 2017. In 2017, members of Western's faculty averaged a sponsored research income of $166,100, while graduate students averaged a sponsored research income $41,600. The federal government is the largest source of funding providing 46 percent of Western's research budget, primarily through grants. Private corporations contribute 10 per cent of Western's research budget.
  Western's research performance has been noted several bibliometric university rankings, which uses citation analysis to evaluates the impact a university has on academic publications. In 2019, the Performance Ranking of Scientific Papers for World Universities ranked Western 197th in the world, and ninth in Canada, whereas the University Ranking by Academic Performance 2018–19 rankings placed the university 187th in the world, and ninth in Canada.
  Research regarding the human brain has also become a major focus at the university. The Brain and Mind Institute focuses on research in cognitive neuroscience at Western. In 2011, the Institute discovered the blind may perform echolocation by using the visual cortex of the brain. Another 2011 study at Western suggested people who are deaf from birth may be able to reassign the area of their brain used for hearing to boost their sight.
  In 2014, the university unveiled plans for a 4,200-square-foot facility for research in medicine, science and technology, in the study of HIV and other complex human pathogens. Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry's Department of Microbiology and Immunology is globally recognized, in large part due to the groundbreaking discoveries of Dr. Chil-Yong Kang, a Western researcher clinically testing a preventive HIV/AIDS vaccine. SAV001-H is the first and only preventive HIV vaccine based on a genetically modified killed whole HIV-1 virus. The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Phase I clinical trial was completed in August 2013 and reported no serious adverse effects while boosting antibodies in the volunteers. The vaccine SAV001-H holds tremendous promise, having already proven to stimulate strong immune responses in preliminary toxicology tests. It is the only HIV vaccine under development in Canada, and one of only a few in the world.
caption: Robarts Research Institute is a medical research facility at Western's campus. More than 600 people conduct basic and clinical research at the facility.
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