One Health Seminar Series
The One Health seminar series showcases the depth and breadth of One Health research at the University of Guelph. These 50-minute talks feature a 30-minute presentation by U of G faculty, followed by an audience Q&A. Everyone is welcome, particularly graduate students and faculty.
We’re planning for Fall ’24! Check back in August for a full list of speakers, talk titles, times and locations.
David McCarthy
Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) in Waterborne Pathogens: Surveillance, Prediction, and Mitigation
School of Environmental Sciences | Ontario Agricultural College | University of Guelph
David McCarthy leads a multidisciplinary team of researchers from the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences (CEPS), the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC) and the Ontario Veterinary College (OVC). The team aims to understand how pathogens from human and animal waste move through urban water cycles, how they interact with humans and how to reduce the health risks they pose.
To do this, McCarthy’s lab is developing novel technologies to detect pathogens and their sources in near real-time, designing a “lab-on-a-chip” device to enable pathogen detection in the field, and modelling how humans interact with sources of contamination and reduce pathogen loads in the environment. McCarthy’s team emphasizes solutions that are easy to use, low cost, open source and open hardware, to encourage and enable their use in all parts of the globe.
Past Seminars
Check out our past seminars, organized by semester, below. Many seminars are available to view on our YouTube channel.
WINTER 2024
February 8, 2024 | 2:30-3:50 PM | Watch the seminar!
Marie Meloche | Director, Jane Goodall Institute of Canada
“Community-centered conservation and One Health in action: the Jane Goodall Institute’s work”
Marie Meloche has worked with grassroots organizations, local and international NGOs in Canada and the Middle East before joining the JGI team in 2018. As the Programs Manager, she supports the implementation of community-centered conservation projects in Africa and Canada. She believes that the key to sustainable development is to build meaningful partnerships with communities and local actors, with women at the center of the locally-led development strategies.
In collaboration with the Guelph Institute of Development Studies (GIDS) and the Canada India Research Centre for Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE), OHI is delighted to welcome Dr. Andrew Flachs.
February 6, 2024 | 1:30-3:00 PM EST | Watch the seminar!
Andrew Flachs
Social Reproduction and One Health on the Farm: Feeding the World as if People Mattered
Associate Professor // Anthropology Faculty
Affiliated Faculty // Global Studies // SIS
College of Liberal Arts | Purdue University
Talk Summary: Although farms are living spaces that anchor diverse economies, the challenge of feeding the world is dominated by narrow questions of yield, efficiency, and cost-benefit analysis. Combining streams from world ecology, critical agrarian studies, and diverse economies thinkers, Flachs will discuss anthropological case studies from India, Bosnia, and the U.S. Midwest to ask how small-scale agriculture supports living communities in place: feeding the world as if people mattered. Central to this approach is viewing efficiency not as a function of yields, profits, or commodities produced but of reproducing the conditions for local health and wellbeing. The talk will center small-scale agriculture as an engine of social reproduction, the continual creation of communities of practice. This analysis both helps to re-value the rippling benefits of local farm systems and illuminate the profound damage of commercial plantations that emphasize commodity production.
Biography: Dr. Andrew Flachs researches food and agriculture systems, exploring genetically modified crops, heirloom seeds, and our own microbiomes. He is currently an associate professor of anthropology at Purdue University where his work among farmers in North America, the Balkans, and South India asks how we shape and are shaped by the worlds around us. Andrew’s research has been supported by the National Geographic Society, the American Institute of Indian Studies, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, and the US department of education, while his writing on agricultural development has been featured in over three dozen peer-reviewed publications as well as public venues including Sapiens, Salon, and the National Geographic magazine. Andrew’s work has been recognized by several international awards, including most recently as a finalist for the Society for Economic Anthropology Kate Browne Creativity in Research Award and the International Convention of Asia Scholars’ Book Prize. Outside of academia, he is an avid cook, parent, cyclist, and musician who has performed in New York City, St. Louis, Asheville, and the San Francisco Bay Area.
FALL 2023
November 15, 2023 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST
Joey Bernhardt
Towards a mechanistic understanding of global change: from cells to ecosystems and human well-being
Assistant Professor | Department of Integrative Biology
College of Biological Sciences | University of Guelph
October 4, 2023 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Joshua August (Gus) Skorburg
Philosophical Perspectives on One Health
Assistant Professor | Department of Philosophy
Co-Academic Director | Centre for Advancing Responsible and Ethical Artificial Intelligence (CARE-AI)
Affiliate Faculty | One Health Institute
College of Arts | University of Guelph
October 18, 2023 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST
Leah Levac
Lived expertise and intervening on the consequences of resource extraction*
Associate Professor | Department of Political Science
Affiliate Faculty | One Health Institute
College of Social & Applied Human Sciences | University of Guelph
*Public recording of this talk is not available.
November 1, 2023 | 12:00-12:50 PM EST
Liane Miedema
Anthropogenic impacts on environmental systems*
Ph.D. Candidate | School of Environmental Sciences
Ontario Agricultural College | University of Guelph
Liane Miedema is a PhD candidate at the University of Guelph, researching landscape ecology, with a focus on the effects of land mosaics on forest communities, plant functional traits and human-environment interactions. She seeks to find new ways to uncover the connections between living things and their surroundings—both through her research as well as through art and other forms of interdisciplinary work.
Seminar description: Our society is inseparable from the environment, whether it’s the planetary level impact of greenhouse gas emissions on climate change or the local impact of Toronto’s urban expansion on forest biodiversity. This talk introduces three different scales of anthropogenic impacts on the environment and the implications of the increasingly complicated interface between human society and natural systems.
*Public recording of this talk is not available.
WINTER 2023
February 8, 2023 | 1:00-1:50 PM EST | Watch the talk!
David Ma
Ongoing learnings from the Guelph Family Health Study and One Health Perspectives: Intersection between families, environment and animals
Professor | Human Health & Nutritional Sciences
College of Biological Science | University of Guelph
Summary: The Guelph Family Health Study is a longitudinal family cohort study launched in 2014 in the City of Guelph and surrounding communities. Our cohort study has grown to include over 300+ families and through community engaged research has helped us to learn about lifestyle factors that contribute to health. Also, it has grown to help us conduct One Health research at the intersection of families, environment and animals. Research findings focused on lifestyle factors, food waste and pet interactions will be highlighted.
March 29, 2023 | 1:30-2:20 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Quinn Webber
Caribou Conservation and One Health in Canada
Assistant Professor | Department of Integrative Biology
College of Biological Science | University of Guelph
Summary: Caribou are an iconic Canadian species, but their populations are in decline throughout Canada. Anthropogenic disturbance, environmental degradation, and climate change are among the most important drivers of declines. While caribou conservation and management practices in Canada are varied, taking a One Health approach to tackling complex conservation problems could help improve resiliency of caribou populations.
FALL 2022
September 21, 2022 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Paul Sibley
One Health Aspects of Harmful Algal Blooms
Professor | School of Environmental Sciences
Ontario Agricultural College | University of Guelph
October 5, 2022 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Katie Clow
Ticks, Tick-borne Disease and One Health
Assistant Professor in One Health | Department of Population Medicine
Graduate Program Coordinator | Collaborative Specialization in One Health
Ontario Veterinary College | University of Guelph
October 19, 2022 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Andrew MacDougall
One Health and Food Web Assembly
Professor | Department of Integrative Biology
College of Biological Science | University of Guelph
November 2, 2022 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Diana Lewis
Developing an Indigenous-led Approach to Environmental Health Risk Assessment
Assistant Professor | Department of Geography, Environment & Geomatics
College of Social and Applied Human Sciences | University of Guelph
November 16, 2022 | 12:30-1:20 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Catherine Carstairs & Kathryn Hughes
Vaccine hesitancy/resistance in Canada from the early 1980s to the early 21st century
Professor | Department of History
College of Arts | University of Guelph
WINTER 2022
January 13, 2022 | 1-2 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Sherri Cox
The Role of Wildlife Rehabilitation in One Health
Assistant Professor | Integrative Biology | University of Guelph
Wildlife Veterinarian and Medical Director at National Wildlife Centre
January 27, 2022 | 1-2 PM EST | Watch the Talk!
Lauren Grant
One Health and Social Environments: Linking Non-health Data to Improve Health (and Why It Can be Difficult)
Assistant Professor | Department of Population Medicine
Ontario Veterinary College | University of Guelph
February 10, 2022 | 1-2 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Maya Goldenberg
Vaccine Hesitancy: Science, Publics & Democracy
Associate Professor | Department of Philosophy
College of Arts | University of Guelph
March 3, 2022 | 1-2 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Lauren Van Patter
One Health, Multispecies Justice, and the Human-Animal Bond
Kim and Stu Lang Professor in Community and Shelter Medicine | Department of Clinical Studies
Ontario Veterinary College | University of Guelph
March 24, 2022 | 1-2 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Brandon Gilroyed
Evaluating Livestock Mortality Management Techniques using a One Health Approach
Associate Professor | School of Environmental Sciences
Ontario Agricultural College | University of Guelph
March 31, 2022 | 1-2 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Hwan-Suk Chris Choi
An Inconvenient Truth: The Darker Side of Tourism
Interim Director and Professor | Department of Hospitality, Food and Tourism Management
Gordon S. Lang School of Business and Economics | University of Guelph
FALL 2021
September 22, 2021 | 12-1 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Maureen Anderson
One Health and Wild What? Pigs (Yes, Pigs)
DVM, DVSc, PhD, DACVIM
Lead Veterinarian
Animal Health and Welfare Veterinary Science Unit
Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs
October 6, 2021 | 12-1 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Kari Dunfield
Exploring the Role of Soil Health in One Health
Professor and Canada Research Chair
Environmental Microbiology of Agro-Ecosystems
School of Environmental Sciences | University of Guelph
October 19, 2021 | 12-1 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Brian Husband
Crops, native ecosystems and food system sustainability – is this One Health?
Professor and Associate Dean (Academic) | Department of Integrative Biology
College of Biological Science | University of Guelph
November 3, 2021 | 12-1 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Chris Earley
Connecting to Nature: It’s good for you and the planet
Interpretive Biologist and Education Coordinator
The Arboretum | University of Guelph
November 16, 2021 | 12-1 PM EST | Watch the talk!
Claire Jardine
Wildlife and One Health
Regional Director Canadian Wildlife Health Cooperative (CWHC) ON/NU
Associate Professor | Department of Pathobiology
Ontario Veterinary College | University of Guelph
WINTER 2021
January 29, 2021
Dr. Cate Dewey “Pigs, Poverty, and Epilepsy”
U of G, OVC, Population Medicine
February 12, 2021
Dr. Emily Denstedt “Wildlife, Wild places, and Spillover: Insights from the field”
Wildlife Conservation Society in Laos
February 26, 2021
Dr. Kathryn Fair “Physical Distancing, School/Workplace Closure, & Covid 19 in 2020: how many lives did we save?”
U of G, OAC, Environmental Sciences
March 11, 2021
Dr. Daniel Gillis “One Year, One Health”
U of G, School of Computer Sciences
March 26,2021
Dr. Lawrence Goodridge “Salmonella Syst-OMICS: Applying the One Health Approach for Improved Food Safety”
U of G, Dept. of Food Science
FALL 2020
September 2020
Dr. Theresa Bernardo & Dr. Deborah Stacey “The Global Burden of Animal Diseases: A New Addition to One Health Data Resources”
U of G, OVC, Population Medicine & U of G, CEPS, Computer Science
October 2020
Dr. Gus Skorburg “Philosophical Perspectives on One Health”
U of G, COA, Philosophy
October 2020
Dr. Robert Hanner “The Role of DNA Barcoding and Environmental DNA-Based Biomonitoring in Support of a One Health Agenda”
U of G, CBS, Integrative Biology
November 2020
Dr. Jennifer Provencher “Plastic Pollution and Wildlife Health”
Environment and Climate Change Canada, Science and Technology Branch, Ecotoxicology and Wildlife Health Division
November 2020 Dr. Graham Taylor “How Experimental Psychology Can Help Explain Artificial Intelligence”
U of G, CEPS, Engineering
WINTER 2020
January 2020
Dr. Hellen Amuguni “Building a pandemic ready global workforce”
Tufts University, Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine
February 2020
Dr. Travis Steffens “We Are in This Together: Bringing an Anthropological Perspective to One Health Research in Madagascar”
U of G, CSAHS, Sociology and Anthropology
FALL 2019
November 2019
Dr. Francisco Olea-Popelka “One Health: Beyond Medicine”
Western University, Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry
December 2019
Dr. Marc Habash “Application of the One Health Approach to Microbial Source Water Tracking”
U of G, OAC, School of Environmental Sciences
