Innovative Projects Realized

Large deformation finite element analysis of as-laid offshore pipelines using Coupled Eulerian-Lagrangian approach

Subsea pipelines play a significant role in transportation of hydrocarbon. In deep water trenching is difficult and therefore pipelines are often laid on the seabed. However, these pipelines could be penetrated into the seabed a fraction of its diameter during installation. Pipelines might experience thermal expansion due to low ambient and high internal temperature during operation cycles which can cause pipelines to expand axially and buckle laterally. The main objective of the proposed research is to perform finite element analyses of partially embedded offshore pipelines in cohesive soil for lateral displacement of pipelines in undrained condition using Coupled Eulerian Lagrangian (CEL) approach with an advanced soil constitutive model.

This research project was undertaken and completed with a grant from and the financial assistance of Petroleum Research Newfoundland & Labrador.

Teacher assessment using new technologies

Educational reform will require changing the way we assess for student success. Personalized learning will only become a reality as we transform the way we make meaning of teaching and learning through assessment. This industry partner FreshGrade.com is an educational assessment application for elementary education (Kindergarten – Grade 6) addressing the need for a simple, cloud-based solution to help teachers, students, and parents make sense of learning. Tailored for classrooms of young learners, FreshGrade.com facilitates the meaningful and varied collection of rich evidence of learning, creating a digital platform where teachers, students and parents can define and assess success. The overarching question guiding this research is how might new technologies help teachers, students, and parents with the visualization of student data and how this visualization can inform assessment practices.

Consumer dynamics and market strategy for the mobile game, Clandestine Anomaly

In partnership with Zenfri Inc, this project seeks to facilitate the successful introduction of a mobile game called Clandestine Anomaly to the mobile game market. Due to the embryonic stage of the mobile game market this research will use primary and secondary research methods to create a market analysis and inform the market strategy. Firstly, this research will provide an understanding of the business environment by analyzing successful products and their marketing strategies along with industry trends and characteristics. Secondly, this research seeks to understand the psychological needs, goals and motivations of their potential market of consumers and thus, how to create perceived value. Third, this research will integrate the unique strengths and weaknesses of Zenfri inc. into an appropriate strategy based on the insights of the primary and secondary research. The result will be an informed market position that is consistent with the value proposition, marketing messages and product design.

Truck safety survey

Fleetmetrica is a new business startup that offers an innovative and patent-pending technology called SafetyMonitor for monitoring and controlling fleet safety of large commercial vehicles.  Fleetmetrica has achieved success with initial fleets, including improved driver habits using their product and are interested in formally quantifying the effectiveness of their technology. 

Fleetmetrica is also interested in testing their product in conjunction with a fuel efficiency training program called SmartDriver offered by Natural Resources Canada to assess combined benefits of these technologies.  The project will include designing the setup of the experiment, counselling the partner on testing guidelines, and analyzing and reporting on the results.  It will examine effectiveness of the SafetyMonitor and SmartDriver technologies on fleet safety and fuel consumption. Fleets participating in the testing will be given the opportunity to expand the use of these technologies to the remainder of their fleet following the analysis, and a further validation of the results will be carried out.

The International Centre for Northern Governance and Development Masters Degree Cluster 2012-2013

The Master in Northern Governance and Development (MNGD) is a project-based, interdisciplinary program meant to build capacity among northerners in northern Saskatchewan through a blended delivery model including face-to-face, videoconferencing, online and international field school instruction. The 2012-2013 internship research project will contribute to the MNGD graduate students’ research through the examination of community-based responses to rapid change and the development of the local capacity to respond. The project will evaluate the current and potential capacity of northern stakeholders to engage in relationships and implement processes, policies and practices that build resilient and sustainable communities. This analysis will function at the level of the community, and thus, will be informed by their values and interests. Specifically, the objectives of this research cluster are to: assess current community-based, capacity-building programs; explore the viability of implementing new programs; evaluate the overall significance and prevalence of self-reliance and local ownership over community development; and evaluate the strategies for adapting, adjusting and accommodating to rapid change and identified risk factors.

This research is of benefit to the partner organization, Cameco Corporation, and to all Canadians primarily because it utilizes a new approach to dealing with pressing public policy issues that have implications not only for northern Saskatchewan, but for all of Canada, especially its northern and remote regions. In particular, the research will cover a diverse range of topics involving economic development, labour market development, housing, food security, language retention and education and training. The common denominator amongst these topics is their overall contribution to resilient and sustainable community development, which is a fundamental issue that concerns business and governments locally, provincially and nationally in Canada.

Tsawwassen First Nation post-treaty community well being study

In 2009, the Tsawwassen First Nation (TFN) signed a self-governance treaty with the Canadian and British Columbia governments, the first to do so under the Federal-Provincial treaty process. The impact of obtaining self governance outside the Indian Act is, therefore, something that is important, not only for TFN, but as an example for other First Nations communities in British Columbia. This project will carry out an interview survey to determine the well-being of the TFN. This will provide data on the current state of well-being as well as baseline data on measures that can be used again in future years to determine directions of change under self-government. The significance of the research goes well beyond TFN. It is likely that many of the other FNs will ultimately sign a similar ‘treaty’. In doing so, they will be likely be influenced by whether or not the TFN has benefited under self government as identified through this study and subsequent repetitions of all or part of it. Furthermore, this study may provide a template that may be used by other FNs to measure well-being in their communities and whether it changes in it over time.

Ecosystem management of the forests of central Quebec

The deciduous forests of southern Quebec have been heavily impacted by centuries of human disturbances and now bear little resemblance to the forests initially encountered by European settlers. In the coming decades, the climate in this region is expected to change considerably, thus facilitating novel insect pest and disease attacks in these forests. However, not all forests are equally susceptible to these potential threats; certain forest types could prove more resilient than others.

In the proposed  study, we will evaluate the resilience of dominant forest types to climate change and insect and disease attacks in the Centre du Quebec region. We will also identify areas within this region that are particularly vulnerable to these disturbances. The expected results of the proposed study will contribute to the development of forest management strategies that will enhance the resilience of forests in the Centre du Quebec region to future disturbances.

Evaluation, analysis and design of flood-related climate change adaptation policies for Coastal B.C.

Under the 2010, Preparing for Climate Change: British Columbia’s Adaptation Strategy (Ministry of Environment, 2010) the Government of British Columbia has been tasked with integrating aspects of adaptation planning into their policies, legislation and regulations. By evaluating the policies and programs that the Government of B.C. has legislated and implemented to date, this internship will assess the preparedness and resiliency of the coastal communities of the province. In collaboration with the Arlington Group, the intern will focus on a qualitative analysis of current flood management policies and programs within the Government of B.C., designing flood management policy alternatives when existing policies hinder adaptive measures, and then exploring the effects of flood-related climate change adaptation policies on spatial planning. Through these three broad steps, this internship will help to evaluate, and then support, flood-related policies relevant to coastal communities in B.C.

StreetLab Visual Scenery

Hearing loss affects over 1/2 of Canadians over 65 years of age. Remarkably, however, hearing aid adoption rates have remained stable and very low (20-25%) over the past 25 years. This is particularly surprising given the significant, concomitant advancements in hearing aid technologies within the same timeframe. In attempting to identify the causes of dissatisfaction with current hearing aid devices, hearing aid companies are now beginning to appreciate that the effects of hearing loss may extend beyond communication deficits to other critical aspects of quality of life, such as mobility. Studies are being performed at Toronto Rehab’s Challenging Environment Assessment Laboratory (CEAL) to carefully evaluate the relationship between hearing and balance in younger and older adults (with and without hearing loss) in realistic, multisensory, Virtual Reality environments. These studies will also evaluate the effects of different types of existing state-of-the-art hearing aid technologies on measures of gait and balance in older adults with hearing loss and use this knowledge to inform the development and testing of an entirely novel directional hearing aid device currently being designed. This internship will tie into this research by improving the virtual reality environments being employed.

Investigating intercultural skills development and needs assessment of medium and large businesses in Ontario

This project investigates barriers, facilitators, and experiences related to intercultural skills development training and implementation in the workplace. The project involves the examination of current theories and practices of intercultural skills development, as well as industry partners’ perceptions and experiences of diversity in the workplace and intercultural skills training. The research intends to determine how behavior and attitudes toward diversity in the workplace can become more open and inclusive. This project involves a partnership between the Cross Cultural Learner Centre, the Achievement Centre, and the University of Western Ontario. The research will be carried out in London, Toronto and Kitchener, Ontario. The research will use multiple methods including in-depth interviews, focus groups, social media analysis, and an online survey. The output of the project will be case studies, training manuals, and workshops in intercultural skills development that can be used by the Cross Cultural Learner Centre and the Achievement Centre. The findings will be significant for promoting the ability of businesses to work with people from different cultures both locally and globally. The results of the research will be published in peer reviewed journals and presented at conferences.

Development of residential HVAC and air conditioning demand management and control system

Canada ranks very poorly in terms of energy usage per capita and in energy efficiency. As a large portion of this energy is used by buildings, saving the energy consumed by buildings will significantly reduce our carbon footprint. Efforts are underway to incorporate various energy-preserving and generating techniques to create such “Net Zero” (or even Net Positive) energy consuming buildings.  These buildings will be equipped with information and communication technology (ICT) backbone to maximize the energy production by renewable sources and minimize energy consumption by having constant communication with the external smart grid. Intelligent wireless sensor networks sensing various parameters such as temperature, humidity, illumination level and occupancy levels to achieve this goal. Therefore an intelligent sensing, communication and control network will be an integral part of smart buildings. The development of such an ICT backbone is the focus of this project.

Realistic and high-performance rendering

State-of-the-art computer graphics technology allows for the generation of images and animations that border on photo-realistic quality; however, this level of fidelity is often reserved for feature-film productions where the time budget is much more flexible. In the case of interactive graphics, such as approaches that are used in video games, similar demands are made on the quality of the computer graphics output, however much more restrictive computation budgets are imposed: for example, each frame of a computer graphics animation in a video game must be computed in a fraction of a second, as opposed to several hours (the typical budget allotted in feature-film animations). As such, developing interactive image synthesis (rendering) algorithms capable of delivering both high-fidelity results, as well as doing so using very little computation time, is a challenging problem in both applied and theoretical computer graphics. This Mitacs Cluster will segment and address several important problems in the domain of realistic real-time rendering. The results of these internships will be immediately applicable towards the development of more immersive, interactive virtual experiences in the current and next generation of video games and interactive media.