Innovative Projects Realized

Geospatial prediction, prioritization and impact assessment of ghost fishing gear in the Gulf of St Lawrence

Abandoned, lost and discarded fishing gear (ALDFG) has been recognized as a global threat to the marine environment. The use of modern materials in the fabrication of fishing gear mean that these do not biodegrade in the marine environment and can remain intact for decades. As a result, ALDFG can continue to catch and entangle marine life, effectively becoming ghost fishing gear. Detection and removal of ALDFG from the marine environment is one strategy to reduce environmental impacts of the gear. However, locating ALDFG can be extremely difficult, and the geographic position of lost gear is usually not known. This project will develop methods to predict likely areas (i.e. hotspots) of lost fishing gear at the seabed, integrating seafloor environmental, ocean circulation, fishing pressure, and vulnerable species data sets within a Geographic Information System (GIS). Ultimately, the research will develop geospatial risk assessment tools to identify areas of high priority for cleanup based on spatial overlap of species vulnerable to ALDFG impacts and ALDFG hotspots.

Evaluation of best practice police resources to assist in the rapid response of missing persons with dementia

Three out of five Canadians with dementia wander, raising concern as to how it can be managed. Strategies, such as GPS, offer options for finding missing persons with dementia and may be a preferred strategy by police. As part of the Finding Your Way® Program with the Alzheimer Society on Ontario, a series of education resources were developed in 2018 to assist in the location of this population by police services. The impact of these resources has yet to be evaluated by participating police services. The objective of this project will be to evaluate the impact of the resources developed through the Finding Your Way® Program to assist in the location of missing persons with dementia among police services in Ontario. It will involve a series of surveys and interviews with participating police services The Alzheimer Society of Ontario wants to enhance the reputation of the Finding Your Way® program, and reduce the risk of people with dementia going missing. Partnering with researchers, such as the intern, to have credibility and have police partnerships will help make that happen.

Analyse de cycle de vie organisationnelle et stratégies de circularité

Le but du projet est d’accompagner l’entreprise CCM Hockey dans sa transformation vers l’adoption de pratiques environnementales plus vertes, en lien avec les principes du développement durable (DD) et de l’économie circulaire (ÉC). Le projet est divisé en trois étapes. Premièrement, une étude d’étalonnage (« benchmarking ») des meilleurs pratiques de circularité en milieu manufacturier sera menée; La deuxième étape consiste à une analyse de cycle de vie (LCA) des pratiques actuelles de l’entreprise pour ses produits principaux; Finalement, tout en s’appuyant sur les résultats des deux premières étapes, une stratégie de circularité sera établie et mise en marche, par l’adoption de nouvelles pratiques et d’un tableau de bord avec des indicateurs managériaux de performance environnementale.

State space models in credit and operational risk management

This project targets development of applied methods and practical solutions to risk management problems where only partial observation of a system is possible. Such settings are commonplace in financial and other context but can be challenging to address due to a limited number of production-grade ready-to-use solutions. The scientific component of the project employs approaches from a quickly developing and active area in machine learning. More extensive use of these approaches by Canadian banking institutions will lead to a more robust financial system and better service. The focal application areas in this project target the improvement of the value proposition to bank’s customers, accurate prediction of credit losses, and better sales outcomes in multi-product salesforces of financial services.

Apprentissage d’une pondération dynamique des constituants d’une méthode d’ensemble

L’utilisation de méthodes d’ensemble, dont l’usage est très répandu, permet souvent d’obtenir des résultats de haute précision mais sont beaucoup plus difficilement interprétable que les modèles d’apprentissage automatique traditionnel (arbres, régressions logistique/linéaire, ect). De plus, les méthodes d’ensemble sont généralement appliquées de façon relativement naïve, avec des méthodes d’agrégations des estimateurs telle que la moyenne ou le mode des prédictions de ces derniers, laissant présager qu’il serait possible à la fois d’en augmenter la précision en essayant de pondérer les multiples estimateurs qui forme la méthode d’ensemble, mais aussi d’en augmenter l’interprétabilité en ne sélectionnant qu’un seul estimateur (le plus performant) dans la région de l’espace concerné.

Corporate Member Benefit Product at The Kingstonist

As an intern at the Kingstonist, I will be helping a local journalism website based in Kingston, Ontario to pivot from an advertising-based business model to a subscription-based business model. The reason for a pivot is due to increased competition in the geographical area as well as insufficient revenue from advertisements. Technically, this transition will be achieved by turning on a paywall to Kingstonist.com in November/December of 2020. However, my role specifically consists of creating a Corporate Member Benefit Product and communicating a Kingstonist offering to corporations to make available to their employees. Our value proposition must be exceptionally communicated and executed to retain loyal customers while attracting new ones. I can expect to engage in competitor analyses, reach out to companies, adapt to customer requests, and manage the product’s overall success. By the end of 2020, we hope the research project changes yields at least 1000 paying members from the 1.3 million monthly visitors.

Currently, Kingston’s news market is an oligopoly where there are only a small number of sellers. I believe that this project’s contributions will allow The Kingstonist to expand their platform and change the local news market into a monopoly by eliminating competitors such as YGK. Through transitioning to a subscription-based business model, the company will connect with local businesses and create a mutually beneficial relationship with the Kingston community. This rapport will increase business opportunities through the pooling of resources and gain a competitive advantage over other news sources.

New Future Creative Growth Strategy Project

New Future Creative is a creative agency striving to help clients by creating custom-designed Augmented Reality experiences, GIFs, and other animation assets that capitalize on new trends in technology and social media. Their technologies enable brands to better connect with their customers by stimulating organic interactions, especially currently when in-person interactions are so limited. As an intern, I will be focused on sales and business development. One of my activities will be prospecting clients and researching their business strategies to offer services with a tailored approach. I will also nurture and retain relationships with clients that extend beyond the original sale to establish long-term strategic partnerships. Secondly, I will assist with NFC’s marketing strategy, involving executing a marketing campaign to drive website visits and increase brand visibility. Moreover, I will spearhead the management of NFC’s marketing channels, including working with content calendars, developing promotional materials, and updating their website periodically. My last key objective is to launch the Brighter Future Initiative, a community service project dedicated to helping mission-driven companies by providing our custom-designed filters and other digital assets for free. The main goal of this initiative is to help those most impacted by the pandemic who cannot rely on their traditional marketing methods. In summary, this research project will allow NFC to grow their operations, better market their brand, review and streamline their services and processes, increase their client base, and engage in service-oriented activities that will help Canadian brands and artists by offering free digital assets during COVID-19.

Project Coordinator, Finance

This app is especially important in the current climate. An app that is revolutionary enough to change the traditional ways of conducting business will help improve ordering and paying in a contactless restaurant/ hotel environment. Covid-19 has made changed the way that people dine around the world. A platform that makes contactless service easier is needed now more than ever. A survey by Restaurants Canada shows that 1 in 10 restaurants have permanently closed due to Covid-19. The ones that survived now rely heavily on delivery/ contactless dining. Contactless service is the new normal in the hospitality industry, and businesses are looking for ways to make this mode more convenient for customers.

Any company hoping to provide an app that helps these restaurants/ hotels offer contactless service must be able to enhance services that these businesses are already providing. Being able to communicate the revolutionary aspects of a product is often challenging. The best way to overcome this challenge is to provide a product that understates but over-delivers. uSuite believes that the product they are offering these establishments is revolutionary, this project will help the company communicate the innovative product using research, technology and various financial models.

WWiKY BioSciences Inc. – Business Development Intern

At this point we are in need of an update to our business plan in order to expand our options to find financial support within the current economic climate.
We need to expand our list of government support options, explore multiple markets to widen our net of potential investors, to explore multiple international markets, explore additional potential partnership options.
We also need to explore and potentially modify the commercialization plan for our current research product as there is potential for use of hypoxia-detection in tissues potentially damaged by COVID infection. Like all start-ups we face the challenge of needing to find funding to being on staff and yet need personnel to do the work to make the money…. Growing Canadian start-ups require these types of bridging and growth support opportunities.

Microstructure Evolution and Thermomechanical Fatigue of Service-Exposed Coke Drum Materials

There is a growing demand when it comes to the repairing of the coke drum since most of the current in-use coke drums has been in service for decades. This study will develop a new methodology to assess the microstructure evolution and thermal mechanical properties of service-exposed coke drums. The focus of experiments of this project involves high temperature fatigue test to evaluate the fatigue life of the material. Through the studying, the evolution of microstructure evolution will be better identified and understood, providing the foundation of the analysis in the future. Finally, an optimized heat treatment procedure to help in repairing of the coke drum is to be developed, which will greatly benefit Suncor in the quality of repairing and reduce the cost.

Effects of Geomagnetic Disturbances on Power Transformers

Explosive eruptions on the sun’s surface eject charged particles that may travel the earth path. They cause disturbances in earth’s magnetic field and as a result, a low frequency current is induced in electrical power system transmission lines. The induced current increases operating temperature of power transformers. This overheating reduces lifetime of the transformer and may even lead to a catastrophic failure of the transformer. In this project, the overheating is evaluated by measuring amount of byproducts generated in oil insulation of the transformer including dissolved gases and bubbles. These byproducts are indicators of insulation deterioration. The measurements are performed under various conditions, and novel contactless measuring techniques are developed in this regard. Results of this project provide power system operators with critical limits on operating temperature of power transformers to increase their lifespan and prevent catastrophic failures during a geomagnetic disturbance.

Nonlinear Projection Methods for Prediction of Trends in Cancer Incidence and Mortality

Main aim of this project is to develop a prediction model for cancer projection, with detailed information regarding incidence, mortality and other measures of cancer burden for the most common types of cancer, presented by age, sex, time and geographic locations. These data can help stimulatenew research as well as assist decision-making and priority-setting at the individual, community, provincial/territorial and national levels. This prediction Model can be implemented by using historical data to model trends of cancer risk, and extrapolating the trends into the future to project the rates and numbers. Monitoring cancer incidence and mortality time trends is essential for cancer research and health-care planning.