David McDonald visited us to tell us more about wood mechanics and the implications for refining. He also gave us useful information about the academic cooperations and transformation in the paper industries in Canada.

David McDonald was the vice-president, university programs and strategic partnerships, at FP Innovations – Paprican until his retirement at the end of 2009. McDonald has published over 60 papers in refereed journals. He is a fellow of both TAPPI and PAPTAC and has received many awards including PAPTAC's highest technical award, the John Bates Gold Medal. Dave is a Senior Advisor for the Marcus Wallenberg Prize and, as a physics graduate student, he was supervised by Bertram Brockhouse the 1994 Nobel laureate in physics.