Projets novateurs réalisés

Application of Data Analytics Approaches for Solvent-Assisted Bitumen Recovery Pilot Analysis

This project will develop data-driven models for production performance analysis and optimization for solvent-assisted bitumen recovery operations and related processes. Effective operations of solvent processes are crucial for improving oil production and maintaining a low solvent-to-oil ratio (SOR). Although the recent developments in digital oilfield technologies have enabled real-time surveillance of downhole operating conditions and production data, analyzing the large amount of collected data remains challenging without customized data analytics tools.
The industry partner has gathered a comprehensive data set in a pilot study. Data-driven approaches will be integrated to establish relationships between the collected data and relevant reservoir (operational) parameters. The project outcomes will offer important insights on how to optimize solvent operations. This knowledge is crucial for field-scale operations design.

Just-In-Time Scaling of Cloud Based Video Games using Machine Learning

Ubisoft’s cloud-based video game ecosystems experience the workload up to 5+ millions players in a typical week. Workloads on game servers are of different scales, ranging from tens of clients per game server to thousands of clients for traditional workloads. To guarantee game player user experience, a pool of servers is launched to react to demands but servers are idles in most of the time. Scaling down servers is even more complex because of the persistent connections to maintain the states and records of players and games. Current scaling tends to guarantee service requirements but incurs significant hosting costs of idle servers. This project aims to investigate a Just-In-Time scaling of game servers. We develop machine learning models to produce more accurate workload in terms of active servers needed. Our approach applies decision fusion to achieve better workload forecasting. Machine learning models are integrated to game platforms of Ubisoft. The success of this research forms a base for a larger scope of collaboration that incorporate more games and online game servers towards a Just-In-Time cost saving scaling system on cloud resources.

Catalytic Design for the Conversion of Fructose to 2,5 – Furandicarboxylic Acid

Carbohydrates are promising bio-feedstocks to synthesize functionalized compounds. The US Department of Energy identified seven compounds with a high oxygen to carbon ratio as alternatives to sugar fermentation to ethanol. Transition metals oxidehydrate fructose to 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA), a monomer for green plastic (polyethylenfuranoate). The aim of this project is to develop a micro-fluidized bed process that converts fructose to FDCA. Applying WO3/TiO2 catalyst yielded of
22% to furfural and 15% to diformyl furan. Assessing Mn-TiO2, C-TiO2 catalyst in the process is one of the targets of this project. Screening tests will determine the most important parameters to improve the yield.

The development of short fragment SCODA (sfSCODA) for diagnosticapplications.

Emerging research indicates that a variety of short (<200 bp) nucleic acids contain a wealth of biological and medically-important information. Two attractive sources of short nucleic acid fragments include formalin fixed embedded tissues (FFPEs) and circulating nucleic acids (CNAs) in blood. The medical value of these tissues is often limited by researchers’ ability to extract useful and pure nucleic acids. It is difficult to purify such short nucleic acids using leading nucleic acid purification technologies, due to the low affinity of the purification columns, resulting in low yields of short nucleic acids. This project has the potential of purifying short fragments using a modified version of a novel electrophoretic technology (SCODA). Engineering SCODA for this purpose will allow the high yield purification of short nucleic acid fragments from complex samples, unlocking valuable diagnostic information.

Styrenic Polymers Debromination and Recycling

The current feedstock of en-life high impact polystyrene (HIPS) is currently impossible to be valorized and recyled due the presence of brominated fire retardants (FRs). The presence of those FRs is consequence of the need from the electronic industry
to compile with the security regulations. However, now those brominated compounds are to be banned due its harmful and hazardousness nature in humans and environment. Thus, a debromination process is required in order to allow HIPS recycling and valorization. The main duties during the research internship will be to be part of the daily work at the lab and to conduct the necessary analysis using the proper equipment. For the following 4 months the student will be primarily working with the main reactor (planetary ball mill). His duties will be to define the optimal conditions like time, rotation speed ratio plastic/catalyst/solvent, type of solvent etc. for the wet treatment of plastics in the planetary ball mill.

Micro Refinery Unit, GTL

The Home University, the Home Supervisor and the intern involved with this Mitacs Globalink project agree to be bound by the standard intellectual property (IP) terms of the Canadian university and, furthermore, hereby irrevocably assign all their rights, title and interest in and to any Project Intellectual Property to the Canadian University, as may be further detailed in a separate agreement to be signed by all parties involved. “Project Intellectual Property” shall mean any and all Intellectual Property developed by the intern during their internship at the Canadian University. By signing this memorandum, after having consulted with and obtained approval from the authorized personnel of your respective university, you are acknowledging that you agree to the standard IP terms of the Canadian University and to the assignment of the Project Intellectual Property. Finally, as the intern and/or the home supervisor may, in certain cases, have access to confidential information in the course of the project, all parties hereby agree to sign any confidentiality agreement reasonably deemed necessary by the Canadian University. The parties recognize and agree that the terms herein supersede any prior representation, agreement, negotiation or proposal pertaining to intellectual property

Excitation Energy Transfer in the Chlorosome Light Harvesting Complex

In Green Sulphur Bacteria, the chlorosome is the organelle responsible for the harvesting of solar energy, and for the transportation of this energy to the rest of the photosynthetic system. This is attained through the use of many pigment molecules, on the order of thousands, that are present within the chlorosome. These pigments absorb the sun’s energy in the form of electronic excitations. Recently developed models for the electronic structure for the chlorosome, in which the pigments are arranged as molecular nanotubes, will be adapted for use with quantum-dynamics simulations to model excitation energy transport within the chlorosome. This will create a more detailed picture of this fundamental energy transport mechanism in natural photosynthetic systems like Green Sulphur Bacteria, and will promote our understanding of both natural and bio-inspired photosynthetic systems.

Effet de la fatigue sur l’interaction entre la douleur et l’effort physique

Dans le cadre de mon doctorat, j’ai pu mettre en évidence que 30 min d’engagement dans une tâche cognitive exigeante induit une la fatigue mentale associée à une augmentation de la perception de l’effort lors d’une tâche motrice subséquente. Des données du laboratoire de Dr Pageaux suggèrent une interaction entre la douleur et l’effort nécessaire pour maintenir une performance motrice. Ce projet a pour but d’intégrer les travaux de nos deux laboratoires, afin de mieux comprendre l’effet de la fatigue sur la douleur et l’effort nécessaire pour maintenir une tâche motrice.
La fatigue sera induite par l’engagement prolongé dans une tâche cognitive exigeante (Stroop). La douleur, l’effort et la performance motrice seront mesurés avant-au milieu-après la réalisation de la tâche cognitive. Une seconde visite, contrôle, reproduira ce protocole à l’exception de la tâche c

Creating a Digital Marketing Model Built on Corporate Social Responsibility

The proposed project seeks to better understand how contingency, dynamic capability, and task-technology theories factor in business process management models that apply to the business needs of SMEs and allow multiple system integration. Because a lot of research shows that the alignment of the business and IT goals of a company is crucial for business system success, the proposed project will focus on studying the possible integration of business goals and IT capabilities in the process of business management system creation. Finally, the research project will analyze the application of the four decision areas (people, strategy, execution, and cash) and three focus points (priorities, data, and rhythm) in business system improvement and apply them to develop and implement solutions for the company.

Distributed Net-Enabled Information Fusion and Resource Management underUncertainties

Scalable systems must seamlessly grow to absorb large data sets and incorporate increasing

numbers of processing units within in various communication fabrics. Broadly considered, this concept

applies to cores sharing memory, processors sharing a bus, nodes sharing a network in a

grid/cluster/cloud, or services sharing compositions of components. Ironically, attempts to add more

resources-whether they are physical processing elements or higher-level services-cannot always

be easily incorporated into existing systems.

This project explores practical means of achieving scalability by considering three different but interrelated

issues: parallel design patterns for high level system organization, tool support to help

developers reason about the tradeoffs between programming effort and system performance, and

light-weight resource monitoring and composition tools to support this evaluation. Combined, we

believe these three elements will support software development practices critical for building scalable

systems, as well as produce much needed corresponding tool support to assist developers in modern

software evolution and maintenance.

Méthodes de prédiction pour la collecte d’huile usagée

Le projet de recherche porte sur la prédiction probabiliste d’une demande intermittente.
On cherche à prédire la distribution statistique du niveau de remplissage d’un réservoir en fonction du temps, à l’aide des données des derniers services. Ces prédictions permettront d’optimiser les fenêtres de temps des prochains services. De ce fait, on augmentera le taux de remplissage moyen des réservoirs collectés ainsi que la profitabilité des routes.

Songs, Stories and Sacred Fire: Fostering Reconciliation Through Collaborative Research in Unama’ki

This is a program of research activities through which we will create and compile materials about L’nu and broader Indigenous histories and experiences related to military history. Our materials are to guide the Atlantic Memorial Park Society in its development of Indigenous content at their new heritage site in North Sydney. Songs, Stories and Sacred Fire: Fostering Reconciliation through Collaborative Research in Unama’ki is a collaborative arts-based project, grounded in Indigenous knowledge and traditions. Our project team involves a partnership a group of researchers based at the Centre for Sound Communities, involving multiple generations of researchers from Membertou First Nation and Cape Breton University, and the Atlantic Memorial Park Society. Our project includes many different activities and outcomes to foster dialogue across Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities, and to facilitate lasting social impact for our work. It includes education and public programming; publications; and the production of digital media (e.g., audio and video recordings). Participants of the project will be involved in a variety of Indigenous and arts-based research processes including film screenings of earlier collaborative research, creative workshops, teepee storytelling sessions, digital storytelling workshops