Building a Digital Development Readiness Tool with Indigenous Communities

This project will develop a new tool to identify strengths and needs in communities. This tool will be designed for and designed with Indigenous communities. This project will be a partnership between an Indigenous tech company, Function Four, and a research team at the University of Winnipeg. F4 already has and digital community assessment tool and the team will build on this tool to create the comprehensive assessment tool. This tool will assess areas that include community infrastructure, food production, health, and sovereign wealth development in Indigenous communities.

Sensor Development and System Intelligence for Smart Hive and Apiary Management

Honeybees play a significant role in the Canadian economy for pollinating crops and producing honey. One third of our food comes from the crops and vegetables benefiting by pollination from bees. Around the world, honeybees are facing significant challenges, and this has led to increased costs of production for food products. This research project will develop technologies for the monitoring and management of apiaries.

Nutrition for Two: development of interactive nutrition research tools and a pretrial for food and nutrition intake trend among the First Nation’s pregnant women

Prenatal alcohol exposure results in a vast spectrum of teratogenic effects and lifelong implications for a child, called fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD). Since FASD is not genetic-related and there is no treatment to reverse damage caused to the brain, earlier nutrition intervention to pregnant mothers may be a key to prevent or mitigate the severity of FASD.

Sensor Development for Intelligent Apiary

This project will design an Apiary Management System to control and study environmental conditions that affect beehive health and honey production. Several efforts will be undertaken in developing this intelligent hive concept. In-hive environmental sensors will be implemented and thermal backplane will be developed to regulate the temperature within the hive. Sensors will be installed for studying bee movement, activity, and population. In the environment surrounding the apiary, food type and availability will be studied.