Walk through UBC’s Biodiversity Research Centre and you might hear an argument in the hallway.

Not an angry one. It could be a debate about evolution, a new research method or an idea that has just occurred to someone on the way back to their office. For Professor Dolph Schluter, those spontaneous exchanges are part of what makes the centre special.

“People walk around just spewing ideas constantly,” says Schluter, an evolutionary biologist in UBC’s Department of Zoology. “It’s just a fun place—the hallways are alive.”

Now Schluter and fellow evolutionary biologist Professor Sally Otto are helping ensure a new generation of researchers can become part of those conversations.

Both have received prestigious awards recognizing their research. When Otto received a MacArthur Fellowship in 2011, she used some of the award funds to establish an internship program for graduate students through the Biodiversity Research Integrative Training and Education (BRITE) program. The internships give students opportunities to explore career paths in industry, government, non-profit organizations and elsewhere.

“People matter so much,” says Otto. “I feel like I gained a lot of support here at UBC and previously in my training.”

Years later, when Schluter received the 2023 Crafoord Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (the equivalent to the Nobel prize in biosciences), Otto’s example was still with him. He saw an opportunity to pay forward the support he had received by helping shape the careers of future researchers.

“The university made me,” says Schluter. “It’s a very collaborative unit, and I feel like that kind of environment was really important to my continuing research.”

Schluter contributed part of his prize to create an endowed postdoctoral fellowship within BRITE. Then, in 2025, Otto contributed funds from her Killam Prize, joining Schluter and other donors in building the fellowship. What began with graduate internships now supports research training at multiple levels.

For Schluter, investing in people was especially important. Postdoctoral researchers at the Biodiversity Research Centre are not tied to a single lab. Instead, they can collaborate across research groups, bringing new methods, perspectives and ideas with them.

“The postdocs contribute to the social and intellectual life of the department,” he says. “I feel like that’s at the heart of the Biodiversity Research Centre.”

That investment comes at a critical time. With climate change bringing an unprecedented threat to biodiversity, Otto says the next generation of researchers will face enormous challenges.

“It gives me a lot of hope to work with early-career scientists,” she says. “They have the vision, they have the passion, they have aspirations to fix this world. And I want to help them along the way.”

Researchers supported through these programs are already studying everything from sex chromosome evolution and disease transmission to changes in bird populations as temperatures rise. They also bring something less tangible to UBC: new ideas that circulate through labs, seminars and, inevitably, those lively hallways.

Philanthropy gives people an opportunity to turn those ideas into action, Otto says.

“In the case of Dolph and me, we saw that students need internship opportunities, that there was this missing layer of postdoctoral fellows and funding. Rather than, ‘Oh, I wish it were the case that we had more postdocs,’ we actually made it happen.”

And the impact can travel far beyond UBC. As young researchers move into universities, industry, government and other careers, Schluter hopes they carry that collaborative spirit with them—creating new communities where ideas can flourish.

Reflecting back on past BRITE trainees, Otto and Schluter already see that spirit paying forward.

“What we need to do is help elevate and help support them,” she says, “so they can really fly in their careers.”