Stephen Wright
Vice-Dean, Research & Infrastructure
Professor, Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology
Contact
Email: vicedeanresearch.artsci@utoronto.ca
Tel: 416-978-7897
Executive Assistant: Christine Yarish
Office: SS2005, Office of the Dean, Sidney Smith Hall, 100 St. George Street
Portfolio
The Vice-Dean, Research & Infrastructure is responsible for supporting and enhancing the research mission of the faculty, including research funding for new faculty members, providing support for external research funding, and managing the faculty’s Canada Research Chairs and facilitating commercialization opportunities.
Areas of Responsibility
- Research support
- Extra-departmental research units
- Infrastructure planning
- Institutional Strategic Initiatives (ISIs)
- Industry research partnerships
Biography
Professor Stephen Wright joined the University of Toronto in 2008 as an assistant professor in the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology and became a full professor in 2016. Prior to joining U of T, he was an assistant professor at York University and an NSERC postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Irvine.
Professor Wright has held an E.W.R. Steacie Fellowship and a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair. In addition to these research awards, he also won the Steacie Prize for Natural Sciences in 2017 and the Margaret Dayhoff Award for Research Excellence in 2016. He was also admitted to the College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists, Royal Society of Canada in 2015. In 2023, he was the winner of the Canadian Society for Ecology and Evolution’s President’s Award for research excellence.
Professor Wright is internationally recognized as a leading scientist in the emerging field of plant evolutionary genomics. His research makes use of genomic approaches to address long-standing evolutionary questions of both fundamental and applied importance: What fraction of genomic differences between populations and species results from adaptive evolution? What are the evolutionary consequences of transitions in mating systems? What are the major evolutionary processes driving the spread and success of agricultural weeds?
At U of T, Professor Wright served as chair of the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology from 2019 to 2022. He served as interim chair and interim graduate chair from July 2023, until December 2023.