The City of Delta, the City of Surrey, and the Semiahmoo First Nation in British Columbia are testing the feasibility of restoring historic salt marshes to reduce the risk of coastal flooding by installing a pilot project to test multiple salt marsh rebuilding techniques in Boundary Bay.

This project aims to assess the degree of sociospatial polarization of green space in the City of Laval, Quebec, compared to the Montreal Greater Metropolitan Area (Communauté métropolitaine de Montréal, CMM) and identify which areas in the city have reached or have the potential to meet proposed metrics for distributional inequalities in green spaces. The project will also quantify relationships between proposed metrics and economic indicators, and evaluate whether target measures are more likely to be more equitably achieved if key areas, such as golfs, are preserved, or restored.

Residential wastewater is one of the largest sources of water pollution in Canada. Before being discharged to the environment, the wastewater needs to be treated to reduce risks posed to human health and the environment. However, the vast territory of Canada and the disparate locations of communities makes it a huge challenge to set up wastewater treatment infrastructure and provide necessary training and maintenance.

Of the five mass extinction events preserved in the fossil record, the Ordovician-Silurian mass extinction (the so-called “first mass extinction”) is unique in that it had extremely limited long-term impacts. Despite eliminating over 50% of all species on Earth at the time, shallow marine communities around the globe rapidly recovered, providing scientists a unique opportunity to understand the processes that enable ecosystems to withstand rapid climate changes.

Forestry is a cornerstone for many communities, and maintaining forest ecosystems is critical for habitat conservation and the maintenance of wildlife. The aim of this project is to build knowledge that will aid in promoting sustainable forestry and more resilient forest ecosystems. Climate change is increasing the severity and frequency of drought events. In this project we will test if trees that are grown with other species are more resilient to drought. This study will evaluate the resilience of the mixed species forests (lodgepole pine and Aspen) across a moisture gradient.

Nicotine is a highly addictive chemical and smoking is still, to this day, the leading cause of preventable death. Several pharmacological strategies have been approved for smoking cessation and nicotine addiction treatment. However, these strategies are not always effective and lead more often than not to relapse. Hence, new nicotine cessation products and devices are needed that are safe and effective. Towards this goal, Ditch Labs is designing a nicotine replacement device to make quitting smoking personalized and safe.

There is increasing urgency to accelerate sustainability progress and address growing social and environmental challenges. Current approaches to solving these complex issues, such as new technology and governance, are failing to support the kinds of changes needed to collective wellbeing. Interest is growing around how individual values, worldviews, beliefs, and consciousness can be transformed so that they align with sustainability requirements.

The proposed research will use camera trap footage collected since 2009 to answer questions relating to grizzly bear conservation and status within British Columbia. Observed numbers of female bears with cubs will be analyzed in relation to Pacific salmon returns to a specific river on the coast of BC, to determine if there is a relationship between grizzly cubs in an area and the amount of salmon available across years. By using a large data set of images, this project aims to provide a big picture image of trends relating to food and wildlife birth relationships.

This research project is a collaborative effort between the University of Waterloo and Oceana Canada and is guided by several core objectives:
1) To define, compile, and assess best practices (BPs) that are commonly used for reducing plastic production in selected international jurisdictions;
2) Explore and examine the mechanisms, barriers, policies, policy instruments, etc.

Acid rock drainage (ARD) can impact waterways. Forecasting and control of ARD will be imperative for mine sites with varied climate in the arctic. The application of genomics to identify the microbes in industrial settings has advanced considerably. This project will focus on subarctic waste rock piles from the Red dog mine owned by Teck, Canada. The intern will study the microbiome associated fine grained materials collected from 2 waste rock piles a legacy (<40 y) and recent material (<5 y).