Innovative Projects Realized

Conversion des veilles et diagnostics manuels vers une solution intelligente / Capture et transformation des données externes

Conversion des veilles et diagnostics manuels en une solution intelligente / traitement des données externes à l’organisation

International Space Station Hemp Seed Germination- On Ground Proof of Concept

This project investigates the feasibility of growing cannabis (Hemp) in space on the International Space Station. Hemp represents an ideal crop due to it being a highly productive species creating significant amounts of oxygen, essential nutrients, and various products (including textiles, oils, and plastics if processed). As human space exploration increases in frequency and reaches further into the unknown, astronauts will require effective means to sequester carbon dioxide, produce oxygen, and various plant-based products. In addition to the above benefits, long-term space travel creates significant stressors on the human psychological state. where interacting with plants has been shown to provide many benefits. Establishing Hemp cultivation in space would provide many advantages and benefits to space dwelling populations.

Wireless gas sensor based on activated carbon and nanofibrillated cellulose for detection of food spoilage

Monitoring the quality of perishable food is critical for reducing the societal costs. A wireless intelligent gas sensor based on biomass/heavy oil-derived activated carbon will be prepared to monitoring the spoilage of food. Agricultural/forest biomass residual materials such as straw, sawmill waste, and logging residue, and cheap and abundant bitumen are feedstocks yielding high porous activated carbon via a two-step process consisting of low-temperature pyrolysis (<600?) and high-temperature activation (1100-1200?). The activated carbon will be modified to prepare volatile sensor. The cellulose-based film used as base substrate for energy harvesting circuit, RFID chip, and volatile sensor will be prepared with nanofibrillated cellulose. Once this can be done, it will provide a reliable smart wireless gas sensor with good selectivity, sensitivity, low cost, and real-time responsibility to monitor the spoilage of food during the transport and storage.

Novel Boundary Element Method for Inductance Extraction in Cables of Complex Cross-Sections

The proposed project is dedicated to fast resistance and inductance extraction for multiconductor transmission lines. Since the complexity of power cable designs has grown significantly over the past decade, fast and accurate tools for electromagnetic characterization are required. The cable models presently used by Manitoba Hydro however are overly simplified compared to the ones available on the market. The alternative surface-volume-surface integral equation formulation is proposed to reduce computational time and memory. During this project the Method of Moments solver based on the novel formulation will be accelerated via hierarchical matrices and/or adaptive cross approximation. This resistance and inductance extractor will be integrated in PSCAD software currently developed by Manitoba Hydro.

Designing, developing and implementation of innovative analytics process to capture insights from multiple marketing platforms

This project aims to build a tool that will help the company automatically gather and analyze data from multiple platforms, such as Google Analytics, Linkedin and Hotjar. This tool will save the company time by removing the need to manually gather and analyze data and will also help the marketing team finding the best strategy to approach customers, either potential or current ones.
With regards to current customers, this project will help the company by gathering feedback on what customers like about the product, what they find most useful, what they find challenging, what improvements they would like to see in the product and so forth.

With regards to new customers, this projects will help the company find out who is our target market and where it is located, how can it be best approached, what problems our potential clients face that they seek to solve by purchasing our product and so forth.
Finding answers to these questions is aimed at improving the overall strategy that the company uses to market itself, acquire new clients and retain them. Furthermore, answers to these questions will lead to better product features, a better pricing model and a more satisfied customer base.

Perspectives of high-resolution 3D reconstruction for automated mapping of cytoarchitectonic human brain areas

The human brain can be subdivided into structural regions based on the organization of neuronal cells. To identify these regions, postmortem human brains are cut into thin histological slices, scanned using light-microscopic scanners, and analyzed by neuroscientists. However, established analysis methods are time and labour intensive and do not scale to the large amounts of acquired image data. This motivates the ongoing development of Deep Learning methods to automatically identify brain regions from microscopic images.
Analysis of individual 2D images is not always sufficient to identify brain regions, as some relevant tissue properties can only be recovered from 3D context. Recent work on 3D brain reconstruction at cellular resolution now enables Deep Learning methods to exploit 3D context information for improved brain region classification. This project will investigate how 3D reconstructed brain tissue can benefit Deep Learning-based classification of brain regions and thus lay the foundation for next-generation brain mapping techniques.

Effect of Saccharomyces boulardii CNCM I-745 in the prevention gluten immunopathology.

The only treatment for celiac disease (CeD) is a strict gluten-free diet, which is very difficult to follow. Despite following gluten-free diet, many celiacs experience ongoing inflammation and symptoms, highlighting the need for additional therapies. We have shown that celiacs have an altered composition of bacteria in their gut, and this leads to defective bacterial breakdown of the essential amino acid tryptophan. Normally, these products of tryptophan digestion signal through the aryl hydrocarbon receptor to modulate inflammation. But, decreased production of these tryptophan molecules by gut bacteria in celiacs may contribute to inflammation, and is a pathway that could be targeted therapeutically. We also found that the probiotic Saccharomyces boulardii can activate the AhR pathway, suggesting this well characterized probiotic could be of therapeutic interest in CeD. In this proposal we will investigate the preclinical effectiveness of Saccharomyces boulardii administration using a celiac-prone mouse model that carries HLA-DQ8, one of the 2 genes necessary for development of CeD.

Assistance tools to build taxonomy of skills and to search for experts

In many applications, we need to find the right person with the required expertise (skills) for some task. To enable this, it is necessary to extract and organize the skills of different persons in a taxonomy. This project aims at developing a taxonomy of skills for the National Bank of Canada. Currently, a small taxonomy has been created manually by experts, but it is far from being complete. Many skills and their variants are missing. The project will construct tools to extract skills from the profiles of the employees. New skills extracted are used to complement the manually created taxonomy. The taxonomy of skills will be used later for expert search – to find the appropriate persons for a task.

Improved Brazing Processes for Attaching Sintered Carbide Tiles to Steel

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Hydrogen Injection System Evaluation

Adding hydrogen to the intake stream in a commercial truck diesel engine can reduce the vehicle’s CO2 emissions. Combining hydrogen available from industrial waste processes with a low cost and robust fuelling system offers a near-term, economically attractive approach to reducing the greenhouse gas emissions from commercial trucking. To support the development of this technology, SFU and Hydra Energy are partnering to investigate the performance and longevity of hydrogen fuel injection hardware. The work will make use of existing facilities at SFU to evaluate the performance of new, in-service, and end-of-life fuel injectors. The findings from this study will help to guide the development of new control strategies that can account for changes in hydrogen fuelling quantity over the life of the injection systems.

Expositions professionnelles aux émanations de moteurs diesel dans un port

Les expositions aux émanations de moteur diesel (EMD) sont omniprésentes et les chauffeurs de véhicules diesels constituent des groupes à risques au regard des fréquences et des intensités d‘expositions. Plusieurs méthodes ont été proposées pour évaluer l’exposition professionnelle aux EMD mais peu d’études comparatives sont disponibles et aucun consensus ne semble émerger. Le projet proposé permettra de tester plusieurs méthodes et permettra à l’association des employeurs maritime de documenter l’exposition de certains de ses travailleurs aux EMD.

Development of Low-Cost, Compact Optical O2 and CO2 Gas Sensors for Portable Metabolic Analyzers

The measurement of O2 consumption (V ?O2, V ?O2 max) and CO2 production (V ?CO2) is important in the health assessment. The goal of this research is to develop inexpensive optical technologies adapted from off-the-shelf components to reduce the cost and improve the performance of metabolic analyzers. VO2 Master, which is our sole partner organization, is a for-profit Vernon-based technology company that manufactures an innovative face-worn metabolic analyzer. The key challenge to be addressed is that commercially available O2 and CO2 sensors (currently integrated into VO2 Master’s analyzer) are not designed to operate under low flow volumes associated with the company’s patented gas sampling technology. Optical sensors will be explored to realize dual gas detection in a compact form factor that is amenable to the flow volumes of VO2 Master’s face-worn analyzer, opening up the potential for both improved performance and lower cost.