Innovative Projects Realized

Mapping blood brain barrier permeability- towards a novel biomarker for psychiatric disorders

Research into brain diseases has until recently focused on neurons, but in the last several decades, blood vessels have taken a new spotlight. When blood vessels are damaged, substances can leak from the blood into the brain. Such leak can affect memory and mental health, but surprisingly, its impact on psychiatric disorders has yet to be studied in detail, largely due to lack of technology to map leaky blood vessels in living patients. Recent advances in MRI technology and computer processing power offer new avenues for solving this issue, allowing us to track blood flow and identify affected brain regions and their role in brain disorders.
In this project, we are developing novel computational methods to automatically analyze brain scans and produce detailed mapping of the regions affected by blood leakage. We are also creating algorithms to see whether leakage corresponds to abnormal patterns of brain activity. TO BE CONT’D

Analysis and optimisation of a sensor network for the remote detection of physiological parameters

Measurement of physiological parameters is the cornerstone of medical diagnosis. The rising costs of healthcare and the aging of the population are factors that influence researches in the medical industry, mainly for the development of assisted living and smart home. Several technologies have been proposed in the literature for monitoring people and health care. Recently, radar technology for monitoring the vital functions of a patient has attracted a lot of attention. With the bio-radar, it is also possible to send a rapid emergency alarm in the case of falls of people, sleep apnea syndromes or the sudden death in newborns, and rescue of survivors after an earthquake. The combination of communication standards and the reconfiguration of architectures have led to an evolution of radar architectures and the development of new technological concepts which can alleviate these important health problems. TO BE CONT’D

Community dynamics in restored salt marshes

Salt marshes are important coastal ecosystems because they provide many services to surrounding areas. Due to the high fertility of salt marsh soil, they have a long history of being converted to farmland in Maritime Canada. In recent years, there has been growing interest in restoring salt marshes to protect against coastal erosion, mitigate sea level rise, and provide increased habitat for birds, fish, etc. Ducks Unlimited Canada (DUC) and partners initiated a large salt marsh restoration project in 2009-2010 in Aulac, NB, with the goals of reverting farmland to salt marsh and assessing the effectiveness of restoration methods. TO BE CONT’D

Clinical Decision Support Software for Prediction of Postoperative Atrial Fibrillation Following Bypass Surgery

The problem of accurately predicting the onset of sustained postoperative atrial

fibrillation (AF) in patients undergoing coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) remains open.

Investigators have reported many clinical indices currently associated with postoperative AF

following CABG. Contemporary machine learning techniques are well-suited to recognizing

underlying trends in ‘training’ data consisting of several labeled examples, and to using the

results to classify new unlabeled data with remarkable sensitivity and specificity. We propose

the development of advanced clinical decision support software capable of automatically

gathering and analyzing relevant clinical data from patients undergoing CABG in order to

provide physicians with objective and non-invasive insights into the likelihood of sustained

postoperative AF so that patient morbidity and mortality, as well as healthcare costs, can be

significantly reduced by targeting appropriate preventative therapies.

Investigation of the strength of bonded joints for lightweight vehicle assembly

In this research project, strength and behaviour of bonded joints is investigated under various loading and geometrical conditions. The interns will prepare specimen in accordance with industry guidelines, test the specimen and record data. Interns will study and investigate the joint behavior under several different scenarios, will model material behavior from the test data. This will enable making reliable prediction of joint performance under different application-specific conditions, using finite element modeling and analysis. The result of this study will enable automakers to use adhesively bonded joints instead of spot welds, thus benefiting from the cost savings.

Abstraction of temporal memory in the human cortex

Episodic memories are made as we go about our daily life: what event has happened, with whom, where and when. The proposed project will target mechanisms of episodic memory retrieval in life-like conditions using advanced neural data analytical tools.
The main notion is that in real-life conditions different episodes/events are not independent, but are connected in a meaningful manner. For example, if a friend sends an SMS about meeting at a train station (event 1) and then sees their friend in front of the station (event 2), these two events are coupled. One could think about many other different types of “event-coupling” (e.g., different stages/missions in a video-game). We aim to formulate formal ways of representing these links, which would then allow us to search for the corresponding neural correlates in the brain. Specifically, it will include triggering episodes in the real-life of the participants using mobile phone technology and studying the interaction between different kinds of temporal-order memory. The research methodology will include advanced functional imaging methods, electroencephalogram (EEG), as well as transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).

Using a gendered lens to examine social-ecological regime shifts within coastal fishing communities

A social-ecological systems perspective analyzes the connections between human impacts and ecological components. Regime shifts are rapid changes in an ecosystem’s structure and function. They are often difficult to anticipate and either extremely costly or impossible to reverse. A gendered lens is crucial in analyzing these shifts as gender roles have been constructed by society, dictating the differences between men and women’s tasks, responsibilities and resources. It is recognized that there are gendered implications of environmental change and that they influence the dynamics of ecosystems. Women are often seen at the receiving end of rapid environmental change without having much control over how these changes were triggered in the first place. TO BE CONT’D

Connecting Culture and Childhood: Using Musical Arts Programming to Promote Belonging for Young Newcomers in the GTA

The Connecting Culture and Childhood Project is a collaborative research project that aims to understand how music functions to support newcomer children in the GTA to both celebrate their heritage culture and integrate into their new communities. This project engages participants from a choir created by CultureLink Settlement Services in research that examines the types of music they sing, why they sing, and what impact singing in the choir has on their integration and socio-emotional wellbeing. Ultimately, this project will demonstrate how music can serves an important part of the transition process for newcomer children and young people in order to contribute to their wellbeing and to their connection with diverse communities. The project will benefit CultureLink by identifying how the choir is supporting newcomer children and pathways for expanding participation across the GTA and beyond.

Green Cement Appraisal for Precast Concrete

This project seeks to appraise the use of three different blended cements, with 25 – 50% lower carbon footprint than commercial Portland cement, in masonry concrete applications. Carbonation will also be implemented as one of the curing scenarios, for an added potential increase in CO2 offset. Work will be carried out at the laboratory-scale first, and later validated in a real production setting at the partner’s site. Promising outcomes will help the partner demonstrate the greenest concrete product yet in the market, an opportunity championed by the local cement and construction industries, and well aligned with various provincial and federal initiatives related to emission reduction.

Leaders Enhancing Employee Wellbeing – Year two

Our objective is to create, evaluate, and sustain an evidence-based leadership intervention to foster employee wellbeing. Based on the leadership development and organizational change literatures, I am proposing to conduct two studies at a provincial-based financial institution. The first study will explore the beliefs and opportunities to model health behaviours in the workplace and serves as the basis for creating a leadership intervention designed for health promotion. The second study is creating a behaviour change theory-based intervention for leaders on how to model health promotion behaviours in the workplace. To evaluate the intervention, I will collect data on and analyze changes in leaders’ behaviours, changes in employees’ psychological and physical health behaviours, as well the potential impact of the intervention on work performance. TO BE CONT’D

Leaders Enhancing Employee Wellbeing

Our objective is to create, evaluate, and sustain an evidence-based leadership intervention to foster employee wellbeing. Based on the leadership development and organizational change literatures, I am proposing to conduct two studies at a provincial-based financial institution. The first study will explore the beliefs and opportunities to model health behaviours in the workplace and serves as the basis for creating a leadership intervention designed for health promotion. The second study is creating a behaviour change theory-based intervention for leaders on how to model health promotion behaviours in the workplace. To evaluate the intervention, I will collect data on and analyze changes in leaders’ behaviours, changes in employees’ psychological and physical health behaviours, as well the potential impact of the intervention on work performance. TO BE CONT’D

National Smart Vehicle Demonstration and Integration Project

In a context of global warming, it is essential to find green alternatives to public transportation. The National Smart Vehicle Demonstration Project aims to improve mobility options for Canadians by advancing the implementation of low-speed electrified autonomous shuttles (LSAs). This project aims to support job growth in the design of technologically advanced electrification, sensing, communication and cybersecurity tools that support LSAs. This research will highlight the added value of owning and operating LSAs, which rely on pricing systems and rely on different usage and maintenance costs for municipalities.The intern works will be useful to the CUTRIC and The National Smart Vehicle Demonstration Project to use localized modeling outputs and to generate empirical evidence to support the allocation of future municipal funding to transit-oriented LSAs initiatives.