Innovating Canada
When people think about Canada’s innovation hubs, they tend to picture the same cities. But some of the country’s most exciting research partnerships – the ones turning lab discoveries into real economic and societal impact – are happening in a province that rarely makes the shortlist: New Brunswick.
New Brunswick’s research ecosystem is small by design, and that’s exactly what makes it powerful. Here, a researcher can sit across from a forest company CEO, a Cabinet minister, and a provincial funder in the same week. The distance between discovery and deployment is shorter. The partnerships form faster. And every dollar invested goes further; for every $1 ResearchNB puts into research, $2.80 in additional funding followed last year alone.
That’s the sandbox advantage.
In health, an AI model trained on thousands of New Brunswick patient echocardiograms is learning to detect amyloidosis – a heart disease that takes an average of six years to diagnose – long before a clinician could spot it, giving patients across the province, including in rural and under-resourced regions, a faster path to treatment while it can still make a difference.
In forestry, AI, LiDAR, and satellite imagery are being used to map forest health in near real time, automating treatment recommendations and modelling wildfire risk for an industry that supports 24,000 jobs and $5.64 billion in provincial output.
In energy, a UNB researcher working directly with NB Power is teaching the province’s transmission grid to read live weather conditions, unlocking 15 to 30% more capacity from infrastructure that already exists, and accelerating the integration of 1,400 MW of new wind energy.
In agriculture, crop residue that would otherwise be burned or buried is being transformed into biochar – a low-cost, homegrown tool for carbon management that could give NB farms a new role in Canada’s climate strategy.
In oceans, DNA-based tools are tracing water contamination to its exact source – whether sewage, agricultural runoff, or wildlife – giving communities and regulators the precision they need to protect drinking water, recreational areas, and aquaculture operations.
Five sectors. One province. Partnerships that are moving research from paper to people.
ResearchNB exists to power this work. By funding research, connecting the right partners, and making sure discoveries made here reach the people who can act on them. The ecosystem is ready. The researchers are here. And the returns, for partners willing to look beyond the usual players, are real.
New Brunswick isn’t waiting to be discovered. It’s already delivering.
Learn more at researchnb.ca/sandbox.
