Although he climbed numerous mountains to conduct high-altitude research, UBC Okanagan’s Mike Tymko admits the peak of his academic career might have arrived in his inbox a few weeks ago.
Tymko is UBCO’s winner of this year’s Governor General Gold Medal. The award is presented to the university’s most accomplished doctoral graduate each spring.
UBCO held an online convocation ceremony on Wednesday.
Tymko, who has published more than 60 research papers, is beyond talented, says his supervisor Professor Phil Ainslie. The pair have worked together since 2012, when Tymko, an undergraduate at Mount Royal University, was invited to join one of Ainslie’s research expeditions to Nepal.
“At the time UBC Okanagan was much smaller and Professor Ainslie was relatively new into his appointment, but you could tell the research team he was building was extremely unique even at that time,” said Tymko. “That was such an amazing trip to me from both a life and scientific perspective.”
Within months, he was a student in UBCO’s School of Health and Exercise Sciences, working on his master’s degree with another colleague from the Nepal project, associate professor Glen Foster, also fairly new to the Okanagan. The pair got along during the 2012 Nepal expedition and created a dynamic and busy research team when reunited at the Kelowna campus.
“I knew that as Professor Foster’s first student I would be privy to more one-on-one training. I appreciate everything that he has taught me over the years and I wouldn’t be the scientist I am today without his mentorship.”
Foster’s laboratory studies how the respiratory, cardiovascular and autonomic nervous systems interact to control blood flow and ventilation in health and disease. And Ainslie, a Canada Research Chair in Cerebrovascular Physiology in Health and Disease, studies cerebral blood flow regulation, how that can be influenced by environmental stress — heat, altitude, pressure — and how exercise can also affect cerebrovascular function.
The research teams would work together for a number of years studying basic aspects of helping people under extreme conditions ó whether that be where they live, or an illness they have ó be able to breathe better.
Tymko explains there are many people — such as those living in Nepal, the Andean mountains and Ethiopia — who live in high-altitude regions. And more than 200 million tourists travel to high-altitude destinations each year. However, his research also impacts millions of people who never get the chance to travel.
“From a more clinical standpoint there are many pathologies that are characterized by low oxygen, such as people living with heart failure, obstructive sleep apnea and lung disease,” he said. “Studying healthy human adaptation to low oxygen in both the laboratory and in the field has implications to better understand the physiological consequences that occur in these clinical states. The findings from these studies are applicable not only to Canadians, but people worldwide.”
During his studies, Tymko has trekked to Nepal in 2012 and 2016, as well as White Mountain, California in 2015 and Peru in 2018 — where he co-led more than 40 scientists at a research station.
“This was undoubtedly Michael’s most impressive feat during his doctorate,” said Ainslie. “So far more than 10 research manuscripts have been published based on data collected during this expedition and many others will come in due course.”
Tymko is humbled by the gold medal win, and says, like the expeditions, it’s a team effort.
“These research projects are never led by one person, they are a product of dozens of people working together towards one goal,” said Tymko. “The best part of these trips are the people you meet — researchers from all over the world. But it’s also a fantastic feeling knowing that your research is meaningful and impactful within the academic community.”