Louis Godbout, an assistant technologist at the McGill Pulp & Paper Research Centre, recently showed Principal Shapiro some new equipment from the Xerox Canada Research Centre. The equipment, worth $500,000, mimics all the functions of the sophisticated, high-speed papermaking machines used by large mills. "This will give students the opportunity of making sheets with same characteristics as those produced by industrial mills," says chemistry professor Robert Marchessault, a researcher at the Pulp & Paper Centre.
The equipment donation is timely. The centre already collaborates with the Faculty of Engineering on a successful master's program in pulp and paper engineering. Recently, the centre and the Department of Chemistry have joined forces to create a graduate program in the chemistry of pulp and papermaking. "It's important for the future of the industry that more qualified chemists get involved," says Marchessault. More complex types of paper are being created and used. "These types of paper involve special coatings, fillers and glues and you need the expertise of chemists to understand how these materials work at the molecular level." Both engineering and chemistry graduate students will profit from the new equipment, a gift from Xerox to the McGill Twenty-First Century Fund.