Innovative Projects Realized

SF6 Innovation Internship

Over 4 months we will work to scope and structure global innovation efforts in one, and potentially more, key areas to tackle large sustainability challenges. The areas are SF6, plastics (with a focus on bio plastics) and agricultural innovation (including soil carbon measurement).
A large focus will be on innovation to tackle the challenge of SF6. SF6 is the worst greenhouse gas, approximately 23,500 worse than CO2 on a molecule-to-molecule basis. It is used in the distribution of power around the world and even the small amounts that leak to the atmosphere have a huge impact. The objective of the SF6 stream is to become a world leader in understanding SF6 from a business perspective with the intent of establishing a B-Corporation to drive innovation to solve the problem.
The intern will work with Eric Beynon (Founder of Sustainable Growth Company) directly with exposure to other innovation partners, including partners in U.S. The project will require a host of business skills, including strategic thinking, analytics and communications.

Lively Web of Things (LWoT)

The term Web of Things (WoT) refers to the concept of integrating resources and interactions involving devices, data, and people on the web. WoT features interactions as first class entities above and beyond traditional web resources and, thus, enabling applications with substantial context awareness, personalization, and automation. Lively is a new open source approach to web programming developed by our industrial partner. It provides a complete platform for web applications, including dynamic graphics, network access, and development tools. The aim of the Lively WoT project is to develop a series of dashboards for different application domains using Lively. Using the Lively Kernel as a code base we will use a model driven engineering approach to generate personalized and self-adaptive dashboards for diverse domains, including cloud computing, big data analytics, and interactive shared video streaming.

Découverte d’anticorps améliorés ciblant LILRB1 pour le traitement de tumeurs solides

Malgré les nombreuses avancées dans le traitement du cancer, cette maladie reste la première cause de mortalité au Canada. Une voie prometteuse de traitement est l’immmunothérapie dont le but est de moduler le système immunitaire afin de renforcer sa capacité à identifier et détruire les cellules tumorales. Dans ce contexte, il est possible d’utiliser des anticorps afin de bloquer des points de contrôles immunitaires, protéines réduisant l’efficacité du système immunitaire. En clinique, des anticorps ciblant les points de contrôles immunitaires ont eu beaucoup de succès, toutefois, plusieurs patients ne répondent pas à ces traitements. Il est donc primordial de développer des anticorps afin de bloquer d’autres points de contrôles immunitaires. Dans cette optique, le point de contrôle LILRB1 est une cible intéressante pour le traitement du cancer. LILRB1 se retrouve sur plusieurs cellules immunitaires et exerce une régulation inhibitrice différente du système immunitaire par rapport aux points de contrôles actuellement ciblés en clinique. Le but de ce projet est donc d’obtenir des anticorps ciblant LILRB1 pour améliorer le traitement des tumeurs solides en monothérapie ou en combinaison avec les traitements de pratique médicale courante. Pour se faire, nous allons modifier intelligemment des anticorps liant LILRB1 précédemment obtenus par Immune Biosolutions afin d’obtenir les meilleurs anticorps ciblant cette protéine. Ensuite, une sélection des meilleurs candidats sera faite grâce à une technique impliquant des levures que nous allons développer et améliorer. Ce projet permettra donc le développement d’anticorps améliorés ciblant LILRB1 et l’élaboration d’une version novatrice de sélection des anticorps sur levures.

JH Sports – Improving health section including training and health programming and implementation of marketing strategies for business growth

JH Sports is Fredericton’s first indoor golf and athlete performance center. It has four full hitting bays with full course simulation, athletic performance center and also offers golf coaching. It offers a full on course simulation software where one can play and practice on over 200 courses worldwide. Presently they are lacking a specialized expertise in the field of training and health programming for which they are looking for an intern, preferably having a background in Kinesiology, who will bring specialized skills and knowledge to enhance the health section of the company, including training and health programming. Also, there is a need for developing new programs and strategies to grow the business and meet the evolving needs of clients for which they are looking for another intern who will be responsible to implement effective marketing strategies for the expansion of the business.

Bioreactor system development for 3D printed vascularized tissue

Our project focuses on developing a state-of-the-art bioreactor system specifically designed for the cultivation of 3D bioprinted vascular tissues. The current limitation in regenerative medicine is the inability to efficiently and precisely cultivate complex vascular constructs. Our proposed bioreactor addresses this critical gap, harnessing advanced sensor technology, individual flow control, automated rotation, and remote operation capabilities.

The significance of this research lies in its potential to revolutionize regenerative medicine. By enabling more effective cultivation of vascular tissues, our bioreactor system could pave the way for significant advancements in tissue engineering, organ transplantation, and drug testing, ultimately contributing to improved health outcomes and quality of life.

New Market Entry Go-to-Market Innovation

Centro Commerce builds first-of-its-kind AI for supply chain. We aim to enter a new market with new technology that we have developed. The new market we intend to enter comprises of ecommerce and omnichannel businesses generating $25M+ in revenue in North America. This initiative requires innovating the marketing strategy and execution to ensure success in this new target market. With the BSI internship, we aim to improve the conversion rate in in this new market as well as increase the total pipeline that is captured by our new technologyl

Makoon Transition; Case management, client intake, clan wellness, family support worker

Makoon Transition is a not-for-profit organization, with partnership from the U of W Inner City Studies work study, students placed at Makoon are able to partake in a variety of social services assignments. This can range from family support, client intake and clan wellness. Aimed to help Indigenous families successfully exit the CFS system.

The Impact of Using Building Information Modeling (BIM) & Digital Technologies for Project Delay Management

Many building construction projects have different levels of risk. The level of knowledge about these risks can impact the project’s timeline and budget. Building Information Modeling (BIM) and digital technologies have the potential to improve risk management in the construction industry. This project aims to integrate BIM and digital technologies into the project management process, focusing on risk management. The study will review different case studies using BIM and digital technologies to develop and monitor a risk matrix and validate BIM and digital technologies processes for risk management. This project will allow the BIM and digital technologies processes to be implemented on future projects. Also, this work will benefit the construction industry by adding to the knowledge base of BIM and digital technologies and the general need for more comprehensive case studies.

Personalized Learning using Private LLM for Specific Course Content

The goal of this project is to use advanced technology, specifically a type of Artificial Intelligence (AI), to process educational content. This allows us to create personalized learning experiences for students in a secure setting. Over time, this unique learning tool will become an essential resource, encouraging students to explore and gain knowledge on specialized topics that they can’t find elsewhere.

Economic Capital Modeling by Using Copulas

Sun Life Financial is carrying out its ERM and ORSA analysis. The company seeks to develop sophisticated and mathematically sound internal models that would serve as company’s own risk measurement tools for EC evaluations, provide continuing insights into the appropriate risk management routes, as well as be a benchmark against the RC required by the OSFI. The intern will concentrate on: 1.) looking at the families of probability distributions, that would describe its various risks sufficiently well, 2.) modeling the dependence structure amongst the aforementioned distributions in a way, that would be close to the one imposed by nature. The project will assist Sun Life Financial to build, implement and validate a quantitatively sophisticated state-of-the-art model of its risk portfolio. This will result in a better quantitative and qualitative understanding of company’s risk profile, and thus in a more precise EC calculation as well as in a more effective risk management decision making process.

Indigenous Clean Fuels Knowledge Transfer Project

The objective of the Indigenous Clean Fuels Knowledge Transfer Project is to increase clean fuels knowledge in Indigenous communities and businesses, and improve the public’s understanding of the measurement, monitoring, verification and data collection strategies for greenhouse gas emission reduction targets and standards used by government, industry and regulatory bodies.
Under this project, the Proponents (FNPA and PTRC) will develop an innovative, targeted Indigenous outreach, engagement and public education strategy focused on clean fuels knowledge in Indigenous communities, featuring facilitation of knowledge transfer among and between Indigenous communities and industry, including the development of post-secondary course materials, best practices guides, toolkits, and mentorship/internship opportunities that can serve as models for academic institutions and industrial partners.

The Proponent will also seek to improve both indigenous and the general public’s understanding of the measurement, monitoring, verification and data collection strategies used in supporting Canada’s greenhouse gas emission reduction targets and standards, as well as in the broader regulatory environment governing the energy and power generation sectors in Canada. Mentoring from both FNPA and the PTRC will help the two interns develop skills in identifying good options for cleaner fuels in First Nations, and also enhance their abilities to consult within their own communities.

JUMP Math Digital Resource Development

JUMP Math is an award-winning Canadian charity that believes everyone can be successful at mathematics and envisions a numerate and equitable society for all through mathematics education. The organization provides research-informed and curriculum-aligned resources and training that instill confidence and spark a life-long love of mathematics. As an organization, JUMP Math has 20 years of experience developing evidence-based student and teacher print and digital resources linked to Canadian and US curricula. In a variety of studies, including two randomized controlled trials, JUMP Math has produced significant improvements in students’ achievement and their attitudes toward math.

JUMP Math wants to build curriculum writing capacity in the field of mathematics education resources in order to meets its objectives of stronger student outcomes and greater human potential and wellbeing. Writing JUMP Math mathematics education materials is a specialized skill requiring a sound mathematics foundation, an understanding of the science of learning, and creativity to produce lively, meaningful, and effective content for any age or level of ability. As mathematics curricula change frequently to include relevant new topics (Financial Literacy and Coding components, for example) and to meet new cultural objectives (Indigenization of the mathematics program, for example), it is important to attract new people with diverse backgrounds to the field. This project will help JUMP Math to create a powerful new digital version of its program and a new process to efficiently create future digital and print editions of the program to meet evolving math curricula.