Innovative Projects Realized

Health benefits of living in a wellness-centred community

The general objective of this project is to test for improvements in the physiological and psychosocial health of residents in a wellness-centred community (e.g. the Wellness Suites) who engage in a prescribed healthy lifestyle that emphasizes regular exercise and a modified vegan (i.e. Pegan) diet. Physiological, molecular, and psychosocial assessments will be used to identify participant progress from day of intake to six months, and to identify new biomarkers of healthy aging. The study will address the importance of a targeted healthy lifestyle to improve quality of life (healthspan) in older adults, improve health recommendations for enhancing healthy aging, and reduce healthcare burdens.

Sustainability Reporting: Lessons on initiating a Sustainability Report in a Junior mining company

This project seeks to simplify and clarify the process of initiating a sustainability report using the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). During Lindsay’s previous Mitacs Accelerate project, she identified the GRI as the best reporting framework for Junior and Mid-Tier miners. Further to this, Lindsay created a “Quick-Sheet” as a tool to help small companies understand the GRI and which identifies and recommends Performance Indicators which represent core sustainability obligations in the mining sector. The scope of the Quick Sheet includes governance, transparency, health and safety, environmental performance, climate mitigation, project financing and engagement with communities. This project will include researching and consolidating “best-practice” advice for how to put into place robust and complete data collection mechanisms, lessons learned from implementation of said advice, and key recommendations for how to make the initiation of a sustainability report a smooth undertaking.

Exploration of Hydrogen Silsesquioxane (HSQ) Formulations and the use of HSQ as a Precursor for Silicon Quantum Dots for Use in Polymer Coatings – Year two

The project will entail the production and characterization of hydrogen silsesquioxane (HSQ), a useful material for both lithography and production of silicon nanomaterials. This material is the workhorse for Applied Quantum Materials Inc. (AQM), as it is one of their central products that they supply to the e-beam lithography industry as well as the precursor for their silicon nanomaterials. Once studied experimental HSQ samples will be transformed into silicon nanomaterials and incorporated into polymers to produce new materials that convert solar UV into more useful red and near-infrared (NIR) light.

Exploration of Hydrogen Silsesquioxane (HSQ) Formulations and the use of HSQ as a Precursor for Silicon Quantum Dots for Use in Polymer Coatings

The project will entail the production and characterization of hydrogen silsesquioxane (HSQ), a useful material for both lithography and production of silicon nanomaterials. This material is the workhorse for Applied Quantum Materials Inc. (AQM), as it is one of their central products that they supply to the e-beam lithography industry as well as the precursor for their silicon nanomaterials. Once studied experimental HSQ samples will be transformed into silicon nanomaterials and incorporated into polymers to produce new materials that convert solar UV into more useful red and near-infrared (NIR) light.

A Longitudinal Comparison of Aripiprazole Vs. HigherMetabolic Risk Antipsychotic Drugs on Adiposity Using MRI

Antipsychotic medication is associated with metabolic abnormalities, including weight gain, an
imbalance between glucose and insulin actions, and higher than normal lipid content. In particular,
adolescent psychiatric patients are at increased risk for Type II Diabetes and cardiovascular disease
when undergoing therapeutic treatment. Current analysis indicates that antipsychotic drugs have
differing effects on body weight gain, fat content and metabolic profiles. Our aim is to conduct the
first-ever study to quantify changes in both whole-body fat, liver-fat accumulation, and metabolic
measurements after the administration of several different antipsychotic drugs in patients with firstepisode
psychosis or bipolar disorder. By utilizing sophisticated imaging techniques, such as magnetic
resonance imaging (MRI) and magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), wc will gain insight into
antipsychotic drug-induced fat accumulation and distribution. The results of this study will provide
important information about the potential hidden harmful effects associated with several drugs and
identify optimal treatment strategies that may guide future clinical studies with patients.

Unit Commitment Problem Integrated with Plug-in Electric Vehicles and Renewable Energy Sources

Electric Power is crucial challenge for every nation. Canada is a developing country and the development of any country is nudged by the amount of electricity used by that country. The size of the power system is growing exponentially due to heavy demand of electricity in all the sectors viz. agricultural, industrial, residential, commercial and charging of Plug-in EVs/HEVs etc. The ever-rising demand for energy has led professionals to look out for renewable sources of energy and with its growing influence. Global warming, degradation of the ecosystem and quality of air requires serious plan of action. More work needs to be done in this sector. Motivated by these research challenges, the intend of the proposed research is to develop a hybrid meta-heuristics research algorithm for the solution of profit based unit commitment problem of electric power system with due consideration of power demand of plug-in charging vehicles and renewable energy sources.

Flow Optimization for Wormhole Regions of Post-CHOPS Reservoirs

This project aims to provide Canadian petroleum companies a comprehensive big-data-analytics tool that concludes the essential controlling parameters which enable successful experimental and numerical studies on CO2-based solvent injection processes in post-CHOPS reservoirs. The proposed database includes relevant experimental research work that expand through multiple experimentation scales, as well as relevant numerical research work that cover from pore network simulation, Darcy-scale reservoir simulation, CFD simulation etc. From experimental database, relevance between physical controlling parameters and recovery performances will be investigated. This enables the selection of the optimum operating schemes in oil field development. From numerical database, the most frequently tuned parameters in Darcy-scale reservoir simulations which facilitate successful history matching can be extracted so as to narrow down the parameters’ adjustment range and thus enhance the efficiency of field-scale simulation and production prediction. Meanwhile, foamy oil stability enhancement, residual oil remobilization, and high-permeability wormhole blockage will be investigated by a state-of-the-art microfluidics laboratory, and such findings will be added into the big data analytics tool for deeper and continuous training and validation. Altogether, flow optimizations for wormhole regions of post-CHOPS reservoirs will be realized.

PREDICT: Parallel Resources for Early Detection of Immediate Causes of Tsunamis

With this project we propose a re-thinking of ICT infrastructure to include a framework that exploits commodity many-core systems to evaluate models. The framework permits comparison, evaluation and improvement of competing and complementary models and appear to hold promise. Our proposal focuses on the computationally intensive tasks associated with near-field Tsunami detection, leveraging parallelism to process environmental conditions in real-time to deliver informed warnings to populations at risk. By keeping a human-in-the-loop, we include new services that support crowd-sourcing within the framework, allowing integration of sensor data with media-rich voluntary participant input. Monte Carlo simulations of relevant ocean models highlight necessary precursors and likelihoods of potential threats.
Expected benefits to ONC includes the advancement of a modeling and simulation infrastructure that can be used in developing a marine hazards detection and notification system that meets global requirements.

Floodplain maps inventory and pathway for flood-induced risk assessment in BC

The BC Real Estate Association aims to develop the localized flood vulnerability index (LOFVI). The intention is to increase awareness of new floodplain maps among governments, realtors and consumers through the final report and assess the impact of senior government funding programs. The first step will be to update and prepare an inventory of floodplain maps across the province of BC, which will provide important information that communities need for land use decisions alongside helping property buyers make informed decisions. Secondly, assessment of flood-induced risks and development of a LoFVI, while taking Kelowna as a case study. The methodological pathway would further help develop a functional index for BC i.e. BCLoFVI.

Investigate machine learning algorithms todevelop anomaly detection methods on real-timedata: Non-parametric approaches

The industry partner, Metafor is developing a new class of IT system management solution. As part of
this project, Metafor is building a product feature that monitors computer and network activities and
looks for signs of anomalies. This is an important problem as anomalies are usually associated with
abnormal user or system behaviors that can potentially result in problems such as system breakdown.
As the properties of anomalies and normal behaviours are stochastic and dynamic by nature, efficient
and intelligent signal processing and machine learning algorithms are required to detect these
anomalies. In this project, the intern will do a comprehensive survey on the state-of-the art of real-time
anomaly detection; investigate a set of system indicators or features as well as machine learning
algorithms that can potentially be useful in detecting anomalies. Finally, the intern will implement
suitable algorithms to predict the presence of anomalies in the system in real time.

Strategic Community Investment – A Toolkit for Junior Exploration Companies

After reviewing a plethora of toolkits published by industry organizations such as the ICMM and PDAC, a set of
simple to use tools have been summarized in the toolkit. The aim of the toolkit is to help junior and mid-tier
producers to understand the importance of sustainability programs and how to best engage with community
members and partner with NGOs. This toolkit is useful for Keegan Resources because it provides management
review tools and guidelines on how to establish key performance indicators to monitor and evaluate its own
progress. Since the toolkit covers topic from stakeholder engagement to establishing partnership, it also
means as the company expands and starts acquiring other exploration sites, its current community investment
efforts is replicable as there will be simple guidelines to follow when entering a new community.

Fischer–Tropsch Synthesis for Production of Synthetic Jet Fuel – Year two

Greenfield Global is developing a process to produce jet fuel from renewable materials, such as waste biomass and organic municipal waste. Fischer–Tropsch synthesis converts a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen (synthesis gas) that was produced from the waste biomass and organic municipal waste into a synthetic crude oil that can be refined to produce jet fuel. This project deals only with Fischer–Tropsch synthesis.

Much is already known about Fischer–Tropsch synthesis and the objective of the work in this project is to fine-tune the catalyst and technology for synthetic jet fuel production. In collaboration with Greenfield Global, a pilot plant with multi-stage tubular packed bed reactors filled with an iron-based catalyst will be designed and commissioned to evaluate the design envisioned for their synthetic jet fuel process. Important objectives are to maintain reaction conditions so that heat can be recovered by generating high-pressure steam, to enable sufficiently high overall conversion that recycling of synthesis gas can be avoided, and to produce a product that would benefit refinery design for jet fuel production.