Innovative Projects Realized

The cognitive neuroscience of indeterminate language interpretation

A hallmark of linguistic communication is that ‘what is said’ often underdetermines ‘what is intended’ by a given utterance. Sentences such as ‘The author began the book’ or ‘The boy finished the game’ are semantically indeterminate because it is not clear what the author or the boy were really doing. When the activity is not specified, interpreting these common types of sentences might rely on different linguistic and cognitive processes. For instance, it is plausible to assume that a sentence such as ‘The author began the book’ licenses an interpretation such as ‘The author began writing the book’, although this is not specified in the sentence. A similar phenomenon occurs in cases where we assume an implicit modifier, as in ‘John had breakfast’ (‘today’) or ‘Mary is not going to die’ (‘any time soon’ or ‘because of x’). These sentences are often said to be ‘enriched’ during interpretation. The questions that this proposal addresses are: How do we succeed in interpreting these sentences? Where does the ‘enriching’ information come from? How much does a denotative representation of these sentences depend on the context of the utterance? And, fundamentally, what are the cognitive and brain mechanisms that allow for their interpretation?

The proposed research program will investigate the nature of sentence interpretation by exploring the cognitive, linguistic, and neurological underpinnings of indeterminate sentence processing. The main goal is to understand the processes responsible for “enriching” the content of a sentence that is otherwise indeterminate. The studies will employ diverse methods and experimental techniques, including psycholinguistic/behavioural experiments (e.g., response time, eye-tracking), and neuroimaging (fMRI). The studies will focus on the comprehension of sentences in context and in isolation, measuring (a) the relative contribution of context to the linguistic process of semantic analysis, (b) the time-course of contextual influence on sentence interpretation, and (c) the neuroanatomical structures supporting semantic and pragmatic processes. Investigating how we combine expressed and unexpressed or implicit information in linguistic utterances is key to understanding human communication, with implications for the investigation of language development and breakdown in cases of brain injuries and diseases.

Mechanism through which an anti-aging natural compound extends longevity of yeast by remodeling cellular lipid dynamics

The fundamental mechanisms of aging are conserved from yeast to humans. We use the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae as a model system with which to study the molecular mechanisms of aging. Our high-throughput chemical genetic screen of extensive compound libraries has identified lithocholic acid (LCA), a bile acid, as a potent anti-aging and anti-cancer compound (Aging (2010) 2:361-370). We found that LCA extends longevity of chronologically aging yeast. Our findings imply that: 1) exogenously added LCA enters yeast cells, is sorted to mitochondria, resides mainly in the inner mitochondrial membrane and also associates with the outer mitochondrial membrane; and 2) delivered to mitochondria LCA elicits a remodeling of lipid synthesis and movement within both membranes, thereby altering the mitochondrial membrane lipidome and triggering changes in mitochondrial size, number and morphology (Aging (2013) 5: 551-574). Our recent data suggest a mechanism underlying the ability of LCA to delay cellular aging by remodeling coordinated lipid dynamics not only in mitochondria but also in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), lipid droplets (LD) and peroxisomes. In this mechanism, the stimulated by LCA changes in mitochondrial lipids and morphology extend yeast longevity by 1) altering the age-related chronology of longevity-defining processes in mitochondria; 2) reducing the extent of mitochondrial fragmentation, thereby slowing down the release of pro-apoptotic proteins from mitochondria and decelerating an age-related form of apoptotic cell death; 3) causing a remodeling of lipid metabolism and transport in the ER, LD and peroxisomes, thereby postponing a previously unknown age-related mode of programmed cell death that we call “lipoptosis”; and 4) remodeling central metabolism in the cytosol, thereby increasing cellular ATP and NADH levels and delaying an age-related decline of mitochondrial functionality. The objective of the proposed research project is to validate our hypothesis on the above mechanism for a delay of cellular aging by LCA. To attain this objective, the intern will use LCA and various genetic interventions to manipulate lipid synthesis, transport and degradation within mitochondria, the ER, LD and peroxisomes of yeast cells. He or she will monitor how these different manipulations affect yeast lifespan and longevity-defining cellular processes. The intern will first examine how LCA affects the lifespans of the following mutant strains: 1) ups1?, tam41?, gep4?, crd1?, cld1?, taz1? and psd1?, each lacking a non-essential enzyme involved in the synthesis of various lipids within the inner mitochondrial membrane or in their bidirectional movement via mitochondria-ER contact sites; 2) fat1?, faa1?, gpt2?, sct1?, ayr1?, ale1?, slc1?, lro1?, dga1? and are1?, each lacking a non-essential enzyme involved in lipid synthesis within the ER membrane; 3) tgl1?, tgl3?, tgl4? and tgl5?, each lacking a non-essential lipase involved in the hydrolysis of triacylglycerols, neutral lipid species that are stored in LD; and 4) fox1?, fox2? and fox3?, each lacking a non-essential enzyme involved in peroxisomal fatty acid oxidation. He or she will then investigate how exogenously added to yeast cells LCA influences the age-related dynamics of longevity-defining processes that integrate lipid metabolism and interorganellar transport into a biomolecular network of cellular aging.

Analysis and Design of Authenticated Encryption Schemes

Authentication and encryption are two intertwined technologies that help ensure data and network security. While in most people’s minds confidentiality is the primary goal of cryptography, message authentication is arguably as important. Deploying two separate primitives for the encryption and the authentication, in addition to being an inefficient solution, may not necessarily achieve the two required security goals. Authenticated Encryption (AE) schemes [efficiently provide both confidentiality and authentication simultaneously. Such schemes are applied in different cryptographic protocols such as IPsec and TLS and hence the security of many applications such as e-commerce and e-contract signing depends on the security of the underlying AE scheme. Recently, there have been a series of disastrous attacks resulting from the wrong application of confidentiality and authenticity primitives. Consequently, and following the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) AES competition, the European Union eStream stream ciphers competition, and the NIST SHA-3 hash function competition, in January 2013, a new a new Competition for Authenticated Encryption: Security, Applicability, and Robustness (CAESAR) funded by NIST was announced. The first phase of this competition started in March 2014. This public competition calls for submissions to select an authenticated cipher portfolio. While being relatively new, the competition has provided a boost to the cryptographic research community to consider the analysis and design of these AE primitives.

The objective of this proposed project is to investigate the security of the AE algorithms and related primitives such as block ciphers, dedicated hash functions and message authentication codes (MAC) schemes. An AE scheme is considered insecure if one can launch a forgery attack with time and memory complexity less than that claimed by the designers. A forgery occurs if the adversary can produce corrupted ciphertext that the receiver accepts but the legitimate sender never encrypted. Relevant to hash functions, AE schemes have a block cipher core, accordingly the goals of this project are to: (i) Apply state of the art cryptanalytic attacks to AE schemes. In particular, we plan to investigate the security of the relevant AE algorithm with respect to variations of differential attacks. Differential attacks aim to diminish the propagation of differences between two plaintexts as encryption rounds progresses, eventually producing two ciphertexts with the same authentication tag. We intend to examine how the differential attacks which has successfully been applied to a wide variety of block ciphers and hash functions can be tuned and utilized to attack various AE algorithms, (ii) Investigate the applicability of software side-channel attack models such that leaking secret data through the AE cache timing. The defence approach often leads to decline in performance and designers sometimes tend to ignore it. Side channel attacks have been successfully applied to block ciphers which support its applicability to AE algorithms, and (iii) Establish the criteria for quantifying the AE scheme resistance towards different sources of attacks, and apply this knowledge to the design of an efficient and secure AE algorithm. More precisely, we plan to provide a complete design for a secure dedicated simple and scalable AES-based AE algorithm, which is intended to operate within a constrained resource environment. Looking at the recently proposed AE algorithms, one can reveal the close relation between AE algorithms and block ciphers.

Methods and Techniques for Security Assessment of Android Apps

Besides typical personal usages, mobile devices are also being integrated into enterprises, government agencies, and military networks. Consequently, these devices held valuable sensitive information which makes them face the same level of malicious attacks that have targeted the desktop environments over the past three decades. Ensuring the securing open mobile platform such as Android requires a robust and rigorous security analysis methods and techniques. For example, while Android is based on a Linux kernel, Android has unique properties and specific limitations due to its specific mobile nature and target applications which makes it harder to detect and react upon malware attacks using conventional techniques originally developed for stationary desktop platforms.

The purpose of this project is to continue the development of a prototype for static and dynamic analysis of Android Applications, which we have developed in the past with one of our industrial partners . We plan to continue enhancing the features of this prototype and further develop new methods and techniques that can be used to assess the security Android Apps.

The Geography of News Project (Nouveau)

During the summer of 2015, I would like to replicate two of the intensive news-flow studies we conducted a decade ago on the Web sites of six daily newspapers, in order to assess whether any changes have occurred in the news maps these newspapers produce. Our initial studies — in 2003 and 2004 — were conducted at a relatively early stage of newspaper companies’ digital platform development and we would expect to see in 2015 much less parochial news packages and greater distinction between the hard-copy and online versions of the newspapers.

News-flow studies are quantitative content analyses which sketch patterns in the circulation of news items, document the extent to which some places and some topics predominate, and identify margins and exclusions in news coverage. Our previous experience with such studies resulted in a very sophisticated and thorough methodology. We downloaded every article from every section of the sites over a composite week and recorded: publication name; date; headline; source agency (e.g., Reuters); international filing origin (which country the story was filed from); national filing origin (which province/state/district the story was filed from, in the case of domestic stories); countries cited (in the body of the story); word count; number of accompanying illustrations; and topic.

In 2003, we studied three self-described “national” newspapers in Canada (The Globe & Mail, The National Post, Le Devoir) and in 2004 we studied three marquee U.S. dailies (The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times). While there were some notable distinctions in the way the six newspapers drew their news maps, there were consistent patterns as well. Specifically, these sites mapped out a highly circumscribed world (by geography and by topic) and thereby reinforced proximity – defined in the journalism literature as geographical, cultural and emotional closeness – as a principal, persistent and very subjective criterion of news value. Refereed articles based on these studies were published in Journalism Studies and the Canadian Journal of Communication, and I was invited by the editors of Aether: the Journal of Media Geography to edit a special volume of the journal dedicated to the geography of journalism (which was published in 2009). This work informs a book I am writing and intend to submit to UBC Press in 2015.

The work would be supervised by myself and a PhD student in sociology who has been working with me for the past 12 years and was instrumental in the original research design.

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s publications. Réalisées en 2003 et en 2004, ces études ont été menées à une époque où les éditeurs de journaux amorçaient le développement de leurs plateformes numériques. En 2015, nous prévoyons une diminution de l’importance accordée aux nouvelles d’intérêt local et une plus grande distinction entre l’exemplaire imprimé et la version électronique des quotidiens.

Analyses quantitatives du contenu, les études sur la circulation de l’information permettent de dégager des tendances en matière de diffusion des nouvelles, de documenter l’ampleur avec laquelle certains lieux et sujets prédominent et de déterminer les marges et les exclusions dans la couverture de l’actualité. La réalisation de telles études nous a permis de mettre au point une méthode très élaborée et rigoureuse. Nous avons téléchargé tous les articles de toutes les sections des sites analysés au cours d’une période segmentée totalisant une semaine. Ensuite, nous avons enregistré les éléments suivants : nom de la publication; date; grand titre; agence source (par exemple Reuters); lieu de dépôt international (pays où l’article a été déposé à l’origine); lieu de dépôt national (province, état ou district où l’article a été déposé à l’origine, dans le cas d’actualités nationales); pays mentionnés (dans le corps du texte); compte de mots; nombre d’illustrations accompagnant l’article; et sujet.

En 2003, nous avons étudié trois quotidiens canadiens dits d’envergure nationale (The Globe & Mail, The National Post et Le Devoir). Puis, en 2004, nous nous sommes penchés sur trois grands quotidiens américains (The New York Times, Chicago Tribune et Los Angeles Times). Bien que nous ayons remarqué des différences notables dans la façon dont ces six quotidiens établissaient leurs cartes d’information, nous avons toutefois noté des tendances communes. Plus particulièrement, ces sites cartographiaient un monde fortement délimité par région et par sujet. Il en résultait un renforcement de la proximité – qualifiée, dans la documentation sur le journalisme, de géographique, culturelle et émotionnelle – en tant que principal critère persistant et très subjectif de la valeur d’une nouvelle. À la suite de ces études, des articles avec comité de lecture ont été publiés dans les revues Journalism Studies et Canadian Journal of Communication. J’ai en outre été invité par les rédacteurs en chef d’Aether: the Journal of Media Geography à diriger un numéro spécial consacré à la géographie du journalisme et publié en 2009. Ces travaux forment la base d’un ouvrage que j’entends soumettre à UBC Press en 2015.

Le présent projet se déroulerait sous ma supervision et celle d’un doctorant en sociologie. Ce dernier, qui collabore avec moi depuis 12 ans, a notablement contribué à la conception du modèle initial de recherche.

New Models in Online Science Journalism

A sense of urgency has emerged in the last decade about the future of science journalism. While it is often argued as an important source of information for non-specialists, science journalism has been heavily criticized as unable to connect with citizens in ways that allow meaningful engagement with science. This critique has intensified as diverse informational environments have appeared online and contentious scientific issues (e.g GMOs, stem cells, climate change, biofuels) have moved towards the misuse of scientific evidence.

The objective of this research project is to build new ways of thinking about online science journalism that present improved solutions to the challenges facing science journalists online. In the words of Stuart Allen, the goal is for this project is “to identify productive ways forward in rethinking science journalism’s changing forms, practices and epistemologies within these diverse informational environments” [Journalism 12(7): 771]. It is here that this project seeks to make an impact by exploring how the emergent ecology of online science journalism (e.g. blogs, podcasts, Skype, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter) can be balanced with various hard-won, old-fashioned virtues of science journalism [Science 324: 1491].

Methodologically, the project will seek to adapt models of print science journalism – rough “portraits” of various ways to construct science journalism from within differing normative frameworks [Journalism Practice 7(1): 62-80] – to the creation of online journalism. This will involve systematic literature reviews, qualitative interviews with online science journalists and the creation of test science journalism.

This research could not be timelier, for Canadian science journalists currently work with limited and underdeveloped strategies for coping with a rapidly evolving online environment and the communication of contentious scientific issues.

Do certain aspects of national culture make corruption more prevalent in some countries?

Corruption is recognized as a major factor hindering the development and advancement of countries where it is prevalent. (By “corruption”, I specifically mean “political corruption”, “the use of powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain” [Wikipedia].) Even where the incidence of corruption is relatively low, corruption when exposed has had dramatic effects, including changes in government as the majority of voters indicated their strong disapproval—this has been the recent history in Canada and particularly in Quebec. One possible reason why corruption is so hard to eliminate from societies where it is prevalent is that certain aspects of their national culture might actually be disposed to corruption-like behaviours. If this is the case, then solutions would need to be far more fundamental than merely enacting laws. This project investigates if certain aspects of national culture affect whether there is more or less corruption in countries of the world.

This study will feature the following major components:

• Conduct a literature review to identify the relevant factors, as described in the following components.

• Identify relevant characteristics of culture that affect corruption. Some research has investigated how a society’s innate culture might affect the incidence of corruption among its citizens. Most notably, Husted (1999) found that certain cultural characteristics (power distance, masculinity and uncertainty avoidance) were correlated with corruption. “Culture” is a very complex concept; it is particularly challenging to characterize numerically. The two most notable research efforts that have tried to classify and quantify culture on the national level are Hofstede’s cultural dimensions and the GLOBE study (Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness Research). By examining more refined perspectives of culture from these studies’ variables, I believe that it is possible to identify relevant cultural characteristics that can explain how culture might affect the national incidence of corruption.

• Identify and collect reliable measures of national corruption. The two primary data sources for measuring corruption will be Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index and the World Bank’s Control of Corruption indicator.

• Identify various other factors that affect corruption (control variables). Several economic factors have been found to contribute towards corruption, such as gross domestic product (GDP), past colonial status, religious work ethic, among others (Treisman 2000). This project will need to demonstrate that culture explains corruption over and beyond other recognized factors.

• Conduct multivariate statistical analyses (e.g. multiple regression and MANOVA) to verify the effects of culture on corruption, while controlling for other known factors.

• The results of the study will be prepared for publication in a conference or journal article, or both.

References

Husted, Bryan W., and Instituto Tecnologico y de Estudios. “Wealth, culture, and corruption.” Journal of International Business Studies (1999): 339-359.

Treisman, Daniel. “The causes of corruption: a cross-national study.” Journal of public economics 76.3 (2000): 399-457.

Monitoring and treatment of surface water

There exist few technologies worldwide for the treatment of large areas of polluted salt and freshwaters. It is proposed to develop technology for in situ treatment of lakes, ponds, and rivers. The main objective is to develop a system for the in-situ restoration, management, and control of water quality to reduce incidences of cyanobacteria blooms through nutrient reduction to lower
than eutrophic levels. The short-term objectives are to determine factors that influence the suspended solids (SS), nutrient (P) and other contaminant removal efficiency and to determine the parameters for system scale-up over the seasonal variations. The initial concentration of TP in the lake water indicates poor water quality in a eutrophic state will be monitored. Then a filtration system will be used for removal of nutrients for on-site filtration. Various filters will be evaluated, in addition to various additives to enhance adsorption capability without clogging. It is proposed to install one or two pilot units on the shore of a small lake. The trials will determine the system efficiency in the conditions particular to Quebec (quality of water and climate). Filtration tests will determine removal of organic matter, SS, nutrients, cyanobacteria, bacteria and toxin levels. The protection and improvement of the water quality by nutrient reduction will improve the aesthetics of the water, health of the community and allow the water to be used for recreational purposes and will ensure the protection of the property values.

Research Chair on Gambling

The Research Chair on Gambling was created at Concordia University in April 2012 (FRQ-SC 2012-2017), its first in Quebec. The Chair provides the research infrastructure on social inequities and lifestyles related to gambling, gaming, and internet use through research, training, and knowledge transfer to partners and collaborators. The main objectives of the Research Chair are to: a) generate a multi-dimensional and multi-level framework for research on gambling, gaming, and internet use as well as associated problems; integrating individual (lifestyles), as well as contextual and socio-cultural (social determinants and inequities) components; b) generate knowledge that will support prevention efforts of at-risk behaviours in most vulnerable populations and actions sustaining health; c) share knowledge with partners, stakeholders, collaborators and the general public on these issues through innovative dissemination and knowledge transfer activities; d) increase the decision-making capacity around these emerging issues and support the training of the next generation of researchers.

Research within the Research Chair revolves around four main projects:
1) ENHJEU: The University Student Gambling Habit Survey/Enquête sur les Habitudes de Jeu des Étudiants Universitaires 2008 (ENHJEU) providing data from a representative sample of undergraduate students in universities in Montreal, Quebec. Young adults are considered vulnerable with respect to risk behaviors and this project aims to achieve a better understanding of their gambling habits and the associated problems with a particular focus on the social, physical, and symbolic dimensions of gambling contexts;

2) ENHJEU-Quebec: The ENHJEU-Quebec Survey-Portrait of gambling in Quebec: Prevalence, incidence, and trajectories over four years investigates the gambling habits and gambling-related problems of adult Quebecers. Two population surveys were completed in 2009, and 2012 gathering information on almost 12,000 respondents. In addition, some participants were followed-up over a period of three years to better assess various gambling trajectories (2009, 2010, 2012). The results of this study will support the Ministry of Health and Social Services and the regional health agencies in planning prevention programs and ensuring services in all regions of Quebec.

3) HERMES: Habitudes de vie Et Recherches MultidisciplinairES (Lifestyle and Multidisciplinary Research, FRQ-SC, 2013-2015). HERMES constitutes a newly developed research steam aiming at exploring and contrasting gaming and online gambling, comparing online with land-based games (i.e. offline gambling/gaming), and exploring individual and relational dimensions of online/offline behaviours.

4) France-Quebec Project: This comparative project was carried out between the Lifestyle and Addiction Research Laboratory at Concordia University and the French Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (OFDT). It aims at presenting a comparative picture of gambling practices of serious gamblers, that is, players who show a strong involvement in the game either by the frequency of participation or by their spending on the game.

Studies towards a Nickel-Mediated Decarboxylative Coupling

Organometallic reactions are important in organic synthesis and are versatile in creating new C-C bonds. In the past decade, late-transition-metal catalysis has gained increasing attention culminating in the 2010 Nobel Prize in Chemistry award for three seminal palladium catalyzed reactions. However, the commodity metal nickel is more economical and desirable than the other d10 elements, such as Pd and Pt. As chemistry is a continuously evolving science, the concepts of green chemistry and atom economy have gained attention. Decarboxylative coupling reactions, due to their environmental friendliness and ease of access, have been favored in recent years as alternatives. A carboxylic acid or carboxylate functionality is employed to replace classic organometallic nucleophiles. Intramolecular decarboxylative reactions have been developed by Steglich[1] and Myers[2][3] and decarboxylative cross-coupling reactions were investigated by Becht[4][5], Gooßen[6][7] and Forgione[8]. However, all these decarboxylative reactions are palladium mediated reactions. The proposal is to develop Nickel catalyzed decarboxylative coupling reactions. Percec et
al. [9] investigated Nickel catalyzed Suzuki-Miyaura typed cross coupling of aryl arenesulfonates or aryl mesylates with arylboronic acids. Scott et al. [10] also found that Nickel catalyzed organozincs can be employed in cross coupling with iodides. Therefore we will investigate the carboxylate functionality as nucleophiles to replace organometallic nucleophiles. Since the development of Nickel-mediated decarboxylative coupling reactions is at an early stage, the
current focus is on intramolecular reactions, Electron rich hetero-aromatic pyrrole carboxylic acids is chosen as starting material to create the nucleophile replacement. The pyrrole carboxylic
acids can be prepared from ?-azidoacetate and ?,?-unsaturated aldehyde through aldocondensation and reductive annulation[11][12]. Catalytic nickel complexes and stoichiometric reductants such as zinc(0) powder will be used to enable a full nickel catalyzed cycle to enable the decarboxylation to occur.

Liquid simulation for visual effects

Research on fluid simulation is ongoing at the Multimedia Lab of ÉTS, currently focusing on SPH liquid simulation. Fluid simulation requires lengthy computation times and should allow some artistic control. Parallel computation approaches are promising for reducing the computation times. Examples of such approaches include the works of Zhang et al. [Y Zhang, B Solenthaler, et R Pajarola. August 2008. « Adaptive Sampling and Rendering of Fluids on the GPU ». In Proceedings Symposium on Point-Based Graphics. p. 137–146.] and those of Hérault et al. [Alexis Hérault, Giuseppe Bilotta, et Robert A. Dalrymple. 2010. « SPH on GPU with CUDA ». Journal of Hydraulic Research, vol. 48, n ? sup1, p. 74–79.]. With respect to artistic control, the simulation should allow artists to force the liquid to achieve some key poses such as what can be done for gases [Michael B. Nielsen, Brian B. Christensen, Nafees Bin Zafar, Doug Roble, and Ken Museth. 2009. Guiding of smoke animations through variational coupling of simulations at different resolutions. In Proceedings of the 2009 ACM SIGGRAPH/Eurographics Symposium on Computer Animation (SCA ’09), pp 217-226.]. It should also allow the artists to efficiently texture the surface of the fluid. The paper by Bojsen-Hansen et al. [Morten Bojsen-Hansen, Hao Li, and Chris Wojtan. 2012. Tracking surfaces with evolving topology. ACM Trans. Graph. 31, 4, Article 53 (July 2012)] is an example of work that tries to address the problem of texturing the surface of liquids.

Characterization of cold asphalt mixes containing recycled materials for pavement design

The objectives of the proposed research projet are:
• To design a cold asphalt mix that contains as much recycled materials as possible but that behaves like a hot mix asphalt (HMA)
o Reclaimed asphalt pavement, recycled shingles and recycled tires will be used
• To evaluate the rutting resistance, complex modulus, fatigue resistance and thermal cracking resistance of those mixes
The cold mixes designed and tested in this project are meant to be used as a replacement for standard hot mix asphalt, so the thermo-mechanical characteristics should be similar, or it should be shown, with different pavement design methods, that those mixes are usable as a replacement of HMA with little adjustments to the thicknesses.
The research project will include a literature review on the subject, and the lab work.