Innovative Projects Realized

Music and Mental Imagery

In a seminal paper, Juslin and Västfjäll (2008) propose that visual imagery—i.e. experiencing images such as landscapes, people or abstract shapes in one’s mind’s eye—is one of several mechanisms by which music induces emotions in the listener. This claim is supported by evidence showing that 77% of a representative sample report having experienced visual imagery during music listening before (Küssner & Eerola, 2019). However, the exact nature of the link between visual imagery and emotional responses remains unclear. In a recent study (Hashim, Stewart & Küssner, 2020), it was demonstrated that suppressing visual mental imagery during music listening by means of an eye movement task attenuates emotional responses. This finding suggests that visual mental imagery is indeed a cause of music-induced emotions. The goal of the current project is to replicate and strengthen this finding by running further experiments with different imagery suppression protocols to rule out possible effects of general attentional processes on emotion reduction.

Analyzing Decentralized Identity Management Based on Distributed Ledger Technology

Identity is one of the most fundamental aspects of our daily lives. From depositing money into a bank account, to attending a friend’s party, almost all of our activities go through some kind of identity relation. Current systems for managing this vast volume of identity “transactions” are mostly central, causing them to be targets for several kinds of attacks: (1) The identity data can be stolen, (2) the central entity can be subject to coercion, and (3) the user data can be used against the will of the user. As an alternative, the control of identity can be pushed to the users and the real owners of identities, decentralizing the whole identity management along the way. Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) provides a possible solution to achieve this goal, since it already has several properties that fit nicely with decentralized identity management. We plan to provide a comprehensive analysis of designing DLT-based identity management systems.

Development of biolubricants from vegetable oils for non-internal combustion engine applications

The aim of this study is to develop novel biolubricants based on complex esters for non-internal combustion engine
applications, and the main task of this project include synthesis and characterization of complex esters derived
biolubricants. vegetable oils cannot be used directly as lubricants due to some performance limitations such as
thermal and oxidative stability. In this project, drawbacks of vegetable oils (Lesquerella, sunflower, canola, palm,
and tung oils) will be overcome via chemical modifications by two methods, i.e., esterification/transesterification
with polyhydric alcohol to produce complex esters. The process parameters such as amount of catalyst, acid-toalcohol
ratio, reaction temperature and reaction time will be optimized in this project. Typical biolubricant
properties, e.g., kinetic viscosity, viscosity index, pour point, flash point, cloud point, dropping point, demulsibility
and thermal oxidation stability as well as wear scar properties and coefficient of friction will be investigated.

Strategic Growth Internship

This research project involves developing strategies and actionable recommendations to support the partner organization in transitioning its client base. As part of its long-term growth strategy, the company aims to work with medium and large enterprises and organizations.

Conversion du modèle d’affaires ContinuumRD en un parcours numérique d’encadrement de l’innovation : Portion gestion de l’innovation

Le stage a pour objectif d’appuyer la transformation du modèle d’affaires de ContinuumRD en une version numérique de cette dernière. Ce stage couvre la portion “Gestion de l’innovation” réalisée par la stagaire Nanette Sene et sera supervisé par M. Riad Hadou en appui l’administrateur de ContinuumRD (Stéphane Carpentier) et jumelé au professeur Fabiano Armellini de Polytechnique Montréal.

GV 360

Le contexte de la pandémie a forcé les gestionnaires à revoir leurs stratégies communicationnelles afin de mieux desservir la clientèle. Le Groupe SLRO s’appuyait anciennement sur des événements de réseautage fréquents afin d’attirer, retenir et maintenir un lien étroit avec sa clientèle. Puisque l’entreprise a dû mettre fin à ces événements, depuis maintenant presque un an, il y a un manque flagrant à combler quant à la relation client. Ensuite, vu les pressions gouvernementales importantes visant à réduire au minimum les contacts, GV360 doit drastiquement revoir leurs stratégies communicationnelles afin de maintenir leur taux de location actuel.

Dans le contexte de la pandémie actuelle, l’organisation cherche innover en matière de relation client de manière afin d’assurer un flux constant des communications afin de limiter les répercussions de l’absence d’évènement et d’échange en lieu physique. Le projet permettra de revoir l’expérience client grâce à l’innovation et la technologie. La mise en place d’une stratégie de marketing par courriel permettra à l’entreprise de poursuivre son expansion, réduire ces coûts, accroitre la satisfaction et son revenu.

ioAirFlow, Summer Technical Researcher

Because of the renewed interest in building health due to COVID-19, there has been a surge in demand for building audits – particularly around air quality testing. This position is created to focus predominantly on expanding ioAirFlow’s analysis capacity into air quality testing, while continuing to build on the company’s existing indoor environmental quality analysis capacity.

The overall objectives for this project are to, through both primary and secondary research, identify issues and problems commonly found in commercial buildings as well as existing industry solutions that can resolve those identified issues. The project will include researching academic and industry literature to understand what common problems exist in commercial buildings, and how they are commonly resolved, for problems including (but not limited to) poor air quality, inefficiency energy consumption in buildings, issues causing negative health impacts in built environments (“sick building syndrome”), and other issues that generate unnecessary carbon emissions and/or greenhouse gasses.

Life Cycle Assessment of Lithium Extraction and Refining from Saskatchewan’s Brine Deposits

With the growth in demand for electric vehicles and mobile devices powered by rechargeable lithium batteries, demand for lithium is expected to increase by over 200% in the next decade. Current lithium production comes primarily from Australia, South America and China. There are significant lithium reserves in the same Saskatchewan aquifers currently being exploited for their concomitant oil reserves. Although the lithium concentration in these aquifers is lower than in brines being mined elsewhere, new lithium selective extraction technologies show great promise for making extraction of lithium from these aquifers economical. Prairie Lithium has previously identified a lithium selective ion exchange material that can extract more than 99% of the lithium in a brine sample in only 4 minutes. We have also carried out a successful field trial of our proprietary technology at a scale of 50 m3/day of brine. This field trial represents the first successful extraction of lithium at an operating oil and gas facility in Saskatchewan. The project described here involves assessing the environmental impacts of the lithium extraction, recovery, and refining process in support of the full commercial deployment of our proprietary technology.

Arusha Centre – Calgary Dollars Strategic Growth Manager

Calgary Dollars requires a student with combined technical and social skills to deliver innovative solutions for government, nonprofit, and local businesses. The student will deliver Calgary Dollars programming to create, maintain, develop collaborations with City of Calgary staff, business, non-profits, and funders. Calgary Dollars will scale up each segment of users.

Lionstooth Energy – Strategy & Business Analyst

Lionstooth Energy is developing a Dispatch as a Service (DaaS) platform that will automate commercial management and automation of power generation facilities. This is a software-based offering that will involve merging power plant operations, commercial power market fundamentals and artificial intelligence.
The project that will be undertaken by the analyst has the following components:

Review of the current Alberta power market to determine what similar offerings are available and pricing mechanisms.
Review of other North American power markets to determine if the DaaS offering is feasible in these markets.
Development of a go-to-market plan for Alberta, followed by other North American markets as applicable.

Bluesky Equities Ltd. – Summer Student Jr. Analyst

The Intern will be immersed with our team for the summer working on various projects from investment research and due diligence to data base and dash board management for internal financial reporting. Bluesky is an active investor in early stage venture capital and has 70 companies in our portfolio. We screen hundreds of deals a year and an intern will be able to assist in the screening and due diligence of potential portfolio companies. Bluesky will benefit as we have a small team of 7 individuals managing a large pool of capital. There are always projects of value that require attention and time that our team needs assistance with.

Characterization of Cura Tx’s multi-functional human immunotherapy CT101 against cancer

Cura Therapeutics is developing innovative immunotherapies to cure solid malignancies and infectious diseases. Cura Therapeutics immunotherapy platform simultaneously activates the immune response against cancer while disrupting the tumor blood supply. These immunotherapies also induce an immunological memory that prevent cancer recurrence. Currently, there are no treatments on the market or in clinical trials that combine these properties in one single therapy. The objective of this project is to complete the preclinical stage of Cura Therapeutics’ lead immunotherapy (CT001, aka human FIST). The pre-clinical stage includes in vitro experiments to characterize Cura Therapeutics immunotherapies (CT001 variants) and in vivo experiments to determine Pk, Pd, MTD and efficacy studies in combination with immune checkpoint inhibitors in four mouse models of cancer (pancreatic cancer, colorectal cancer, breast cancer and melanoma).The goal is to build a pipeline that targets a broad range of solid malignancies that can be used as a standalone treatment or as combination therapies with CAR-T, Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI), or chemotherapy. The collaboration with Dr. Michel L. Tremblay lab will generate the data necessary to advance to IND-enabling studies.