University Leadership

Dr. David J. Helfand
Acting President & Founding Tutor

David J. Helfand joined Quest University Canada as a visiting tutor for the Fall term of 2007 and continues to work with the University as its President. Having returned from a year as the Sackler Distinguished Visiting Astronomer at the University of Cambridge, he is now Professor of Astronomy at Columbia University where he has served as Department Chair for more than ten years.

His work has covered many areas of modern astrophysics including radio, optical, and X-ray observations of celestial sources ranging from nearby stars to the most distant quasars. He is currently involved in a major project to survey the Galaxy with a sensitivity and angular resolution a hundred times greater than currently available using the Very Large Array radio telescope in New Mexico, the XMM-Newton orbiting X-ray telescope, and Columbia's MDM Observatory in Arizona. The goal is to obtain a complete picture of birth and death (for stars) in the Milky Way.

David teaches primarily undergraduate courses for non-science majors, including one of his own design which treats the atom as a tool for revealing the quantitative history of everything from human diet and works of art to the Earth's climate and the Universe. He also recently implemented a vision he began working on in 1982 that has all Columbia freshman taking a science course as part of Columbia's famed Core Curriculum. He received the 2001 Presidential Teaching Award and the 2002 Great Teacher Award from the Society of Columbia Graduates.

Several years ago, David appeared weekly on the Discovery Channel's program Science News, bringing the latest astronomical discoveries to the US television audience. More recently, his television appearances have been limited to more serious matters on Comedy Central's The Daily Show. He serves on far too many University, government, and American Astronomical Society committees for his own (or anyone else's) good. David believes he is a better cook than astronomer and, ambiguously, most of his colleagues who have sampled his gastronomical undertakings agree.

David can be reached by email at , or by phone at 604.898.8000 or toll-free in North America at 1.888.QUEST.08 (1.888.783.7808).