Lucas Alcantara (left), Graduate Student Research Assistant, Department of Animal Biosciences; Rene Van Acker (right), Professor and Dean of the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC)
The annual Ontario Agricultural College (OAC) Outstanding Staff Recognition Awards at the University of Guelph, ON, were presented at the OAC Welcome Back BBQ held on September 20, 2022. These staff awards recognize excellent work performance, willingness to help others, contributions toward the betterment of workplace operations, and efforts in making OAC a better place to work overall. The recipients of these awards are nominated by their colleagues.
As a Graduate Student Research Assistant during his Ph.D. in Animal Breeding and Genetics at the University of Guelph, Lucas worked on number of data-related projects within the Centre for Genetic Improvement of Livestock (CGIL). As a highlight, he improved a data pipeline that collects and processes data from the Ontario Dairy Research Centre as part of the Resilient Dairy Genome Project, and developed a central database to house CGIL's research data to facilitate data access for students and visiting scholars.
Lucas is described as having excellent technical and team building skills. He is always willing to help others, while having a smile on his face. One of Lucas’s nominators had this to say: