Innovative Projects Realized

Video-Based Fall Detection for Construction Workers Safe

Fall accidents are one of the leading causes for serious work related fatalities and injuries in the construction industry. Every year, construction workers get injured due to falling off of overhead platforms, elevated work stations or into holes in floors and openings in walls. In order to alleviate this issue, several research studies have been proposed for fall detection; however, their practical values in construction projects are still limited. The objective of this research is to investigate the fall detection with vision techniques, as video cameras are becoming more common on construction sites. The research focuses on the detection feasibility under 1) a single monocular camera and 2) a distributed camera network. The results are expected to build a solid foundation to create a vision-based fall detection solution for construction safety engineers, which could help them timely detect and rescue injured workers when fall accidents happen.

Small scale high efficiency purification of compounds

We are developing a new generation of devices for continuous chemical and nano-particle purification, based on the interactions of analyte with multiple types of driving forces in an electro-fluid-dynamic system. The two-dimensional electrofluid-dynamic (2-D EFD) devices, in which both electric field and hydrodynamic pressure are simultaneously utilized in 2-D channel networks to drive the mass transfer, provide better control on the analyte molecules or nanoparticles by simply adjusting the magnitude of pressure. Mixed analytes can be separated based on this theory.
The success of this project will help the partner organization to accelerate their drug development and decrease their budget. Once matured, this device also has great potential to be a good platform to study drug-cell interactions.

Storytelling Medicine

Fear is considered a natural reaction when a child visits the hospital. Much research has been done to

understand what causes it and how to treat it. Current methods to treat child hospital fear works on

decreasing anxiety at specific points in the procedure.

This project will investigate creating a series of tools and procedures that uses storytelling to link all

steps in a childs procedure, all the while calming, distracting, and educating the child.

Development of lead-free solder alloys for electronic assembly

Recent environmental concerns and legislations over the use of lead are driving the microelectronics industry towards intensive search for lead free solder alloys in electronic packaging. Among many lead free solders, Sn-Cu-Ag system has been regarded as the most promising and attractive candidate alloy system for the conventional Sn-Pb solder alloys, owing to its wettability and mechanical properties. However, problems such as the formation of large brittle phases, high melting temperature, low reliability and high cost of silver prevent its wide practical application in microelectronic industry. Moreover, in order to comply with demands for finer pitch and minatory microelectronics, novel lead-free solders with better thermo-mechanical and metallurgical performances are required. The alloys that are developed in this project should address and resolve those issues.

Evapotranspiration and Bioretention Performance in Stormwater Management

Every time it rains, there is a portion of water that doesn’t get absorbed by plants and soils. That water is known as run-off, and it requires management since it can create high energy flows and pick up harmful chemicals (e.g. fertilizers, pesticides, gasoline, tire wear) off the streets, driveways, and other hard surfaces as it flows towards the natural water bodies. This project is focused on analyzing how much runoff can be absorbed by a plant-soil system called bioretention, and whether specially constructed planting beds can help manage both the volume and the quality of runoff. Bow River Basin Council is dedicated to protecting the waters of the Bow River Basin. Addressing the need to manage stormwater runoff in an ecologically-driven and sustainable way is therefore of great benefit to this organization.

Operation Strategies for Energy Storage Systems in a Wind Park

The Wind Energy Institute of Canada has installed a large-scale wind power and energy storage systems. The institute’s goal is to investigate the wind integration techniques and to increase understanding of the industry for energy storage systems. The objective of this project is to demonstrate and evaluate the capability of energy storage system for shifting wind energy over time and providing ancillary services. Multiple functions of energy storage systems can bring more value to them and justify their high capital costs. This project is in line with institute’s research objectives to show how energy storage systems can facilitate high wind power penetration into the electricity grid.

Advanced Particle Hydrodynamics for Film Rendering

In this project, we will be investigating ways of improving the quality of rendered fluids for films. Fluid simulation is an important component in modern films, and we will be building a better fluid simulator capable of simulating more delicate fluid effects (such as water pouring into a glass), as opposed to the larger, more easily computed, fluid scenes found in action films.

Analysis of the implementation of a Model-Based Systems Engineering approach for the conceptual design of advanced aircraft high-lift system architectures

Today, the development of complex products such as aircraft systems is still mainly based on a paper-based requirements and development process which leads to delays, cost overrun and sometimes failure to respond to customer needs. A structured, model-based design approach is considered promising to bring innovation and optimization in systems architectures. The project aims to demonstrate the value of a model-based systems engineering approach opposed to a traditional bottom-up approach for the example of advanced aircraft high-lift system architectures. The open-source framework Capella will be used to provide the partner organization a tailored new methodology, example process and models for the conceptual design phase that will enable subsequently a more efficient and effective development process.

Early Childhood Education project

Early Learning is an impotant undertaking in Canadian society and supporting young children as they move from home to early learning centres onto kindergarten classes is of particular interest and value to educators, helping us to ensure we provide the right environments and supports for all young children. This research will help us to provide the most appropriate learning experiences to young children in new Brunswick and beyond.

Voice Transformation for Interactive Digital Media

The main purpose of the research project is to have the student investigate and develop a voice transformation system that modifies waveforms of recorded speech segments to produce multiple different sounding voices for characters within a video game.

Complex Continuing Care in a Rural Hospital: Optimizing community-based health care

Community hospitals in small towns or rural areas face challenges in delivering health care that will allow elderly members of their community to remain in the community that they helped to build. Using simulation modelling, this project will develop strategies for delivering complex continuing care in rural hospitals that is closely integrated with long-term care, residential care, and home care services. Small towns and rural communities have a tight-knit social fabric and the contributions that family support and community services provide to health care are important factors. This project will be carried out with the Listowel Memorial Hospital Foundation and will focus on the municipality of North Perth, Ontario.

A study of the hydrogeotechnical behavior of in-pit tailings and their interaction with the contact structures – Year two

Mines wastes include tailings and waste rock. Tailings are crushed rock produced by mineral extraction and waste rock is coarse material excavated to create mine openings. These wastes are commonly disposed on the surface in tailings or waste rock piles, which could pose serious environmental and geotechnical issues. Backfilling the openings of underground mines with wastes has become a common practice. The disposal of wastes in open pits is less common, yet is a promising technique. Very little research has been performed on the behavior of tailings disposed of “in-pit” and on their interaction with contact structures. In-pit disposal of mine wastes is underway at the partner’s mine. This is an opportunity to study in-pit disposal that will lead to improvements in the technique and an understanding of its effects on the environment. ponds