Advancing an Artificial Intelligence Platform for Crop-Health Monitoring

Plants can respond to changes in their surroundings and can convey precise information about their health state. Ecoation has developed a multi-sensory data acquisition device to capture this information and has been collecting in-field sensor data along with data labels produced by human experts during data collection. In addition, images of various parts of plant […]

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Modulation of human induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiomyocyte (hiPSC-CM) ion channels and transporter activity, measured by atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS)

During human clinical trials, a large percentage of candidate drugs fail because they are unsafe or ineffective. Even when preclinical cell and animal studies seem positive, problems occur because drugs tested with these models are often not predictive of what happens in humans. Many drugs, including non-cardiovascular drugs, target ion channels of the heart (membrane […]

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Impacts of tidal turbines on marine mammals – Year two

Canada’s coastal regions are an excellent source of marine renewable energy. These regions are also popular with marine mammals, providing good feeding opportunities. However little is known about how marine mammals will be affected by tidal energy developments. Concerns include the impacts of sound on animals’ ability to find food and navigate, the indirect effects […]

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Design, optimization and testing of baffle-type parallel-channel flow field plates within a 200-cm2 fuel cell short stack with a highly-active catalyst – Year two

Enhancing the current and power density in polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) is one of the main challenges to their large-scale commercialization and hence in tune with the pending needs of the PEMFC industry. The volumetric power density in PEMFC stacks is strongly affected by the flow field plates due to their critical impact […]

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Development and application of molecular tools to assess the acute and chronic impacts of petroleum hydrocarbons on birds – Year 2

The Northern Gateway Pipeline and similar projects propose to transport oil from Alberta to tidewater terminals in British Columbia and eastern Canada. Accidental release of petroleum distillates and related by-products would have consequences on the marine ecosystem. To evaluate spill implications for seabirds, we propose to develop and apply molecular tools to assess toxicological and […]

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Applied Mineralogy for Enhanced Processing of Gold Ore from Artisanal Mining in the Arequipa Region, Peru – Year Two

The proposed research has the objective of applying detailed mineralogical research to aid the multidisciplinary development of high speed sensors for real-time ore sorting applications. MineSense Technologies Ltd. is a mining technology company that develops such sensors and while they have successfully demonstrated the application of its core technologies to distinguish ore from waste material, […]

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Data Analytics for Social Network Marketing

Influencer marketing is a new and innovative way for brands to target their customers on social media in a highly accurate and trusted way. Brand partners work with hundreds of influencers over a period of time, which is called a campaign, to create marketing material. This marketing material is shared by both the brand and […]

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Evaluating offline functionality of progressive web applications in e-commerce business: A/B testing and causal models

The project is to understand the potential impact of enabling the offline functionalities on progressive web application utilized as e-commerce platforms. For instance, will enabling offline functionalities help increase revenue by providing a more engaging environment when the connection is poor? Traditional evaluation method is to run online controlled experiments by randomly assigning users into […]

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STEAM Robotics for Teachers: How Educators Learn

Teachers are being challenged to integrate Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics (STEAM) across the curriculum more frequently and effectively. Many teachers are challenged with these aspects for several reasons. In particular, subject areas are still isolated in British Columbia (BC), and only a few schools truly have STEM/STEAM programs. Secondly, STEM is more often […]

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Faecal sludge desiccation rates for optimal design of passive ventilation sanitation systems

VIP latrines and the Aerosan emergency toilet demonstrate tremendous potential for achieving in situ faecal sludge treatment objectives in volume reduction, odour control, etc. In order to determine the potential to scale, lab-based studies and field validation are required to optimize the design. This project seeks to optimize faecal sludge desiccation by simple enhanced passive […]

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Large-Area High-Performance Transparent Electrodes for Pen/Touch Sensor Research – Year 2

Transparent electrodes (TEs) combine high optical transparency and electrical conductivity, useful in different devices such as light-emitting diodes, displays and solar cells. A highly competitive market of electronic devices, such as phones and flexible touch screens as well as a worldwide increasing demand for energy, drives research to improve the performance of TEs. However, mass […]

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