Liz Do

Sounds from the skies: U of T researcher investigates ways to limit aircraft noise

Christopher.Sorensen — Wed, 14 Jul 2021 15:18:51 +0000

Sounds from the skies: U of T researcher investigates ways to limit aircraft noise

Christopher.Sorensen Wed, 07/14/2021 - 11:18

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(Photo by Arlette Lopez via Getty Images)

Liz Do

Topic

Our Community

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Research & Innovation

UTIAS

Anyone who lives under a flight path is familiar with the “whishing” and “whooshing” sounds of an aircraft flying above – noise that the ��Ƶ’s Philippe Lavoie wants to contain to the immediate area around an airport.

Philippe Lavoie
(photo by Meredith Pullara)

An associate professor at the U of T Institute for Aerospace Studies (UTIAS), Lavoie is looking to better understand how an aircraft’s high-lift wing configuration – which gives an aircraft extra lift during takeoff and landing – creates and emits noise.

His team will also explore strategies for mitigating that noise while maintaining aerodynamic performance.

“We are investigating a complex phenomenon that involves fluid mechanics, aerodynamics, acoustics and interactions between the three,” says Lavoie, whose work will involve detailed wind tunnel experiments and high-fidelity computational aeroacoustics (CAA) simulations.

“Ultimately, this work will help develop novel and quiet high-lift system configurations that can be implemented in the next generation of aircraft.”

The project is one of six at U of T to receive funding from the Ontario Research Fund (ORF), and one of five at the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering. It is being carried out in partnership with aircraft manufacturer Bombardier, with preliminary results expected within a year.

“It is through support from ORF and NSERC [Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada] that this leading-edge aeroacoustics research project is made possible at U of T,” says Lavoie.

Lavoie adds that investments from both industry and government have made his work possible. Previous funding enabled the construction of a unique hybrid anechoic wind tunnel, a project that is currently underway at UTIAS.

“The aviation industry has been particularly hard hit by COVID-19 and the travel restrictions,” adds Lavoie. “But the fundamental importance of air travel and air freight remains. It is very important that Ontario continues to support this industry and facilitates innovation in this very competitive sector.”

Meet seven women who are U of T Engineering's 'Grads to Watch' in 2021

Christopher.Sorensen — Wed, 23 Jun 2021 20:20:21 +0000

Meet seven women who are U of T Engineering's 'Grads to Watch' in 2021

Christopher.Sorensen Wed, 06/23/2021 - 16:20

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Clockwise from top left: Samantha Cheung, Chibulu (Lulu) Luo, Marta Overchuk, Karen Chu, Chinmayee (May) Gidwani, Dana Kokoska and Yilin Huang.

Topic

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Graduate Students

Undergraduate Students

As the ��Ƶ airs its virtual spring convocation ceremony, graduates from the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering are marking the end of one journey and the beginning of another.

They will join the faculty’s vibrant, global network of alumni as they continue to address pressing challenges around the world.

Below are seven women from the faculty’s 14 “Grads to Watch 2021” list. Each member of the list was selected by their home department and institute and illustrate the creativity, innovation and global impact that define the U of T Engineering community.

Samantha Cheung

PhD in chemical engineering

Throughout her degree program, Samantha Cheung searched for opportunities to advocate for her fellow graduate students by serving on committees, organizing events and launching new student life programs.

“One of the most important skills I developed during my PhD is emotional intelligence,” she says. “Working with so many people from different backgrounds helped me become a better leader, co-worker and person.”

An active member of the Graduate Engineering Council of Students, Cheung started a Mental Wellness Commission and an Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Commission, both of which have made key recommendations to enhance graduate student life.

She also led the creation of the first-ever U of T Engineering Research Conference, which took place virtually last June.

“I'm also still in awe over how quickly my team put it together,” she says. “It is so important for graduate students to practise presenting their work, and to have a way to connect with each other, especially when labs were shut down due to COVID-19.”

Cheung’s own research focused on optimizing growing conditions for microalgae, single-celled organisms that can produce chemicals used in everything from biofuel to nutritional supplements and cosmetics. Combining this expertise with her leadership experience will, she hopes, enable her to make a difference in Canada’s biotech industry.

“I believe that harnessing the power of biology will be an important part of a more sustainable future,” she says. “I want to be one of the people conducting this impactful research.”

Karen Chu

Bachelor’s degree, civil engineering

Throughout her undergraduate studies, Karen Chu jumped at any opportunity to both represent U of T Engineering and to be a voice for her peers.

She joined the CivClub, quickly moving up each year – from mentorship director, to becoming the student club’s chair. As a student ambassador working in the Engineering Recruitment Office, she helped prospective students make the decision to choose U of T Engineering. And through the Girls' Leadership in Engineering Experience initiative, run by the Engineering Outreach office, she shared her experiences to inspire the next generation of female engineers.

Like many civil engineering students, Chu says the highlight of her studies was survey camp. She and her classmates built their class monument, which consisted of a clear resin table that encased mementos from their undergraduate years, a tetherball pole and a concrete stepping stone with their class year written on it with mosaic tiles.

“This experience incorporated all the elements of U of T Engineering – teamwork, designing and building, fun with friends, hard work and challenges, and a lasting impact,” says Chu.

Her biggest lesson from her undergraduate experience is to never give up and to never hesitate to ask for help – a message she wants to share with current and upcoming first years.

“Asking for help when needed has been vital to my personal growth,” she says. “I also learned the importance of community and communication. No work, especially in engineering, can be done alone and we need to be able to understand each other to accomplish goals together.”

Upon graduation, Chu plans to pursue a career in residential construction and apply her knowledge of building science to design sustainable homes.

Chinmayee (May) Gidwani

Bachelor's degree, engineering science

Throughout her studies at U of T Engineering, Chinmayee (May) Gidwani’s guiding principle has been to help build a sense of belonging among students, whether welcoming new engineering students as part of the F!rosh Week team, or as the Engineering Society’s equity and inclusivity director.

“Being the EDI director was challenging, but I learned so much about different perspectives of the diverse student body, and how to approach reconciling them to come up with solutions that don't leave anyone behind,” says Gidwani.

In her final year at U of T Engineering, Gidwani completed an undergraduate thesis on ethics in artificial intelligence (AI), where she developed a practical framework to approach ethical AI development. This work could be helpful in her future endeavors, as she returns to her PEY co-op placement at AMD to work on operating systems.

If she could describe her engineering experience in one word, Gidwani says it is “rewarding.”

“Even though these past few years at U of T have been challenging, it has been incredibly rewarding to learn and grow from these experiences,” she explains. “All the late-night study sessions and last-minute group meetings have made me more confident in my abilities as a leader and engineer.”

Yilin Huang

Bachelor’s degree in materials science engineering

It was while working as a park ranger in Killarney Provincial Park, near Georgian Bay in Ontario, that Yilin Huang first realized the power of drones.

“During the summer after first year, a team of researchers came to the park with industrial drones for environmental monitoring,” she says. “I became really invested in the idea of using them to monitor and preserve whole, intact ecosystems, and keep these places wild.”

Huang’s passion led her around the world. After her second year, she headed to the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany, where she co-authored a publication on a spectral library of urban materials used as training data for drones. This was followed by an academic exchange to the National University of Singapore, where she specialized in Southeast Asia environmental management strategies.

After her third year, Huang spent a year in Switzerland on a Professional Experience Year co-op internship at Flyability, a drone start-up that specializes in collision-tolerant inspection drones.

“What I learned is that when it comes to new technology, in many instances it’s not functionality that’s lacking, but rather regulations that prevent efficient implementation,” she says. After convocation, she aims to bridge this gap by pursuing a master’s degree in science, technology and policy at ETH Zurich in Switzerland.

Outside of her research, Huang is an active proponent of effective altruism and is a fellow with Stanford’s Effective Altruism Fellowship. She is also an avid violinist, playing with Skule Nite's Band, the Lausanne Student Chamber Orchestra in Switzerland, and the Hart House Orchestra, with which she performed at Carnegie Hall in 2017.

Huang has advice for new students.

"Instead of asking yourself what degree you’ll get in five years, ask yourself what kind of person you want to be in five years,” she says. “Seek the experiences that build towards that and the degree will find a way to work.”

Dana Kokoska

Bachelor’s degree, electrical and computer engineering

Every year, Dana Kokoska volunteered at Girl’s Leadership in Engineering Experience (GLEE), an annual event to inspire young female students to pursue engineering at U of T. It’s one of the many outreach and community-driven extracurricular activities Kokoska took part in – or led – during her undergraduate studies.

She was the Hi-Skule director, leading a team to design and run outreach initiatives for high school and middle school students, as well as the vice-chair, marketing for F!rosh Week this past fall. In the latter role she faced unprecedented challenges, as Kokoska and her team had to find a way to rally students’ spirit, adapt traditions and help welcome first-year students to U of T Engineering – all without stepping foot on campus.

“Working with an incredibly driven orientation committee to deliver F!rosh Week to the incoming class during a pandemic is an experience I will never forget,” she says.

Overcoming such obstacles has shown Kokoska the importance of perseverance.

“U of T Engineering was one of the hardest things I’ve done in my life. I struggled a lot, especially in first and second year, with academics and finding a work-life balance,” says Kokoska. “As I continued in my studies, I learned how to adapt to new challenges. Perseverance, effort, as well as a lot of practice, led me to improve myself overall and gave me opportunities I would have never imagined having. For that I am extremely grateful.”

After graduation, Kokoska will begin working at Honeywell Aerospace as an electromagnetic compatibility electrical engineer. But just like her time at U of T Engineering, she is already carving out time for extracurriculars: “I am also opening a small business, Daydreamy Design, to pursue my passion for the visual arts,” she says.

Chibulu (Lulu) Luo

PhD, civil engineering

“I am passionate about using my engineering skills to address global challenges,” says Chibulu (Lulu) Luo.

Luo’s doctoral research examined current and future trends of energy use and greenhouse gas emissions in one of Africa’s largest and fastest growing cities: Dar es Salaam in Tanzania.

“What was most exciting about my research was the opportunity to explore important sustainability and energy sector questions and conduct extensive fieldwork in Dar es Salaam,” says Luo. “I appreciate the fact that I led doctoral work that both aligns with this passion and aims to inform policies and investments for improved energy access and societal well-being in developing countries.”

In Dar es Salaam, Luo coordinated a diverse team of local graduate students who helped to administer her research survey to more than 1,300 households across the city. Her research has also taken her to Ghana, Zambia and Rwanda.

She says one of her proudest moments during her time at U of T Engineering was helping to lead the faculty’s Engineering Education for Sustainable Cities in Africa (EESC-A) project.

“I still have fond memories of 2018, a time when two of my EESC-A colleagues travelled from Toronto to Dar es Salaam to mark EESC-A’s presence at a policy workshop that I was planning as part of my fieldwork,” she recalls. “My memory is still painted with the joyous image of our after-workshop dinner and celebration at a beachfront restaurant in Dar es Salaam.”

Luo is currently working as a consultant with the World Bank’s Climate Investment Funds, providing research and strategic expertise to various renewable energy projects around the world.

She says she’s not entirely sure what the future holds, but “I certainly want to continue fuelling my passion for research, teaching and topics that are globally relevant and significant.”

Marta Overchuk

PhD, biomedical engineering

For Marta Overchuk, completing her PhD has felt like riding a roller coaster. “It brought some of the most rewarding experiences of my life, but it also taught me not to be afraid of failures, and to learn from them,” she says.

Her thesis focused on the use of light and light-activated molecules to destroy cancer cells with precision. Specifically, she explored how this approach could be combined with nanomedicine to improve the uptake of chemotherapeutics in tumors. The goal is to reduce toxicity while maintaining positive outcomes for cancer patients.

Overchuk earned a Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, as well as a research expansion grant from U of T’s Photonics Innovation Centre, which funded a research exchange to the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H. After graduation, she will take up a post-doctoral position at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Outside of her research, Overchuk is passionate about making science accessible to everyone. She communicates through short-form videos that she shares on her social media channels. She also maintains a connection with her alma mater in Ukraine and delivers workshops to undergraduate and high school students who are interested in studying abroad. By sharing her academic journey and career advice, she strives to provide students in Ukraine with resources and information that were not easily accessible when she was studying there herself.

Overchuk says that collaboration is key to doing high-impact science.

“My advice to grad students would be to find your niche and embrace working with others,” she says. “Not only does it enrich your science and allow you to grow your scientific network, but it also makes your experience so much more enjoyable.”

Read all 14 profiles of U of T Engineering's “Grads to Watch 2021”

Some assembly required: TA designs at-home lab gear, ships to students around the globe

Christopher.Sorensen — Mon, 12 Apr 2021 14:40:19 +0000

Some assembly required: TA designs at-home lab gear, ships to students around the globe

Christopher.Sorensen Mon, 04/12/2021 - 10:40

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U of T Engineering teaching assistant Crystal Liu designed, sourced and mailed 50 lab kits for students to build a mini mechanical tester from home (photo courtesy Crystal Liu)

Topic

Myhal Centre for Engineering Innovation & Entrepreneurship

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Graduate Students

��Ƶ students enrolled in MSE398: Materials Manufacturing and Design Laboratory received a box in the mail a few months ago that included everything they needed to build a mini-mechanical tester machine for their at-home labs.

The package included mechanical parts, electrical components, a printed circuit board and tools.

“You assemble the pieces like IKEA furniture,” says teaching assistant Crystal Liu, who is also a master's student in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering.

To keep remote learning engaging and hands-on during the pandemic, U of T Engineering instructors have gotten creative when it comes to adapting their teaching and lab exercises.

For Liu and course instructor, Scott Ramsay, an associate professor, teaching stream, in the department of materials science and engineering, it was paramount that third-year materials science engineering students still had an opportunity to gain experience performing hands-on work.

“Last spring, Professor Ramsay and I talked about the term ahead [and] we knew the pandemic was far from being over in a year’s time,” says Liu. “We both agreed that we couldn’t have students doing just simulations – it’s just not the same as a hands-on experience.

“So, we decided to send them something.”

Liu began designing a lab kit for the course and, in an effort to help others, made it freely available online. Through the summer, she sourced materials and components. For custom-designed parts, she worked with staff at the Myhal Centre for Engineering Innovation & Entrepreneurship’s fabrication facility to produce them with 3D printers and laser cutting equipment.

By the fall term, Liu had the materials to package 50 lab kits. And by the winter term, she had mailed them to students as far away as the United Arab Emirates, China and Turkey. For students in Toronto, Liu delivered the kits to students’ homes or arranged for them to be picked up.

Teaching assistant Crystal Liu mailed the kits to U of T students as far away as the UAE, China and Turkey (photo courtesy of Crystal Liu)

The course’s first assignment is to build the tester. Once fully assembled, the device is the size of a shoe box. It comes complete with a custom-designed PCB, user interface and all firmware, as well as safety features such as a shield that must be installed for the machine to run and a large emergency-stop button.

For the second assignment, students were provided with a bag of material samples to analyze.

“These include 3D-printed samples, ranging from very brittle to very stretchy, and items you can find in daily life, like tapes and plastic bags,” Liu says.

Once students insert the sample, the machine stretches it, measuring the force being applied, as well as the displacement. The user interface shows the force-versus-displacement curve while the data is saved in real time. Students can then use the information to study the material’s properties and how the data is generated.

The students’ final assignment involved finding an adhesive seam to peel – such as the ones at the top of a bag of chips – to conduct their own peel-force test using the machine.

“They go from learning how to perform a tensile test that is already designed for them, to then having to apply what they learned in order to conduct their own experiment procedure from scratch,” says Liu. “What they’re learning and how they go about it is as close as you can get to what it would be like if they were operating equipment on campus.”

Liu and Ramsay have received positive feedback from students.

“They like how hands-on it has been and really appreciated the amount of time and effort we put into the course,” she says.

Liu’s experience designing the lab kit is helping to inform her own master’s project on designing and implementing open-source hardware in engineering research. The kits were partially funded by Ramsay’s Hart Teaching Innovation Professorship.

“Crystal has worked exceptionally hard on this project and it is impressive that she was able to put this together for our students,” says Ramsay. “The hands-on experience is one of the most important aspects of this course.

“I’m so pleased that we’ve been able to give the students some of that experience in the remote environment.”

After the term wraps up in a few weeks, Liu plans to turn her research, including two mechanical testers, into a startup with the support of U of T Engineering’s Entrepreneurship Hatchery.

“I believe students learn better by building and playing, so this type of device could be beneficial to students at other universities, they could even be used in high school science labs,” says Liu. “However, not everyone can go from freely available design plans to components and to a product. So, through a startup, I’m hoping to make these designs even more accessible to others.”

‘Nobel Prize of computing:’ U of T Engineering alumnus Alfred Aho receives A.M. Turing Award

Christopher.Sorensen — Thu, 01 Apr 2021 13:28:59 +0000

‘Nobel Prize of computing:’ U of T Engineering alumnus Alfred Aho receives A.M. Turing Award

Christopher.Sorensen Thu, 04/01/2021 - 09:28

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Alfred Aho, pictured here in 2015 receiving an honorary degree from the university, earned a bachelor's degree in engineering physics from U of T in 1963 (photo by Roberta Baker)

Topic

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Global

Honorary Degree

Alfred Aho, an alumnus of the ��Ƶ’s Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, and his collaborator Jeffrey Ullman have received the 2020 A.M. Turing Award – widely considered the “Nobel Prize of computing” – for their influential work in algorithms and compilers.

In the late 1960s, Aho and Ullman were key members of research centre Bell Labs. There, they helped create the compiler, a crucial tool that takes in software programs written by humans and turns them into language that computers can understand. Their pattern-matching algorithms are run daily on computers around the world today, while their textbooks on algorithms and compilers have been used to educate generations of software engineers.

The A.M. Turing Award award is named after mathematician and computer scientist Alan M. Turing, who articulated the mathematical foundation and limits of computing. It carries a $1-million prize with financial support provided by Google Inc.

“It’s impossible to overstate the significance of Professor Aho’s foundational contributions to programming and software engineering,” says Professor Will Cluett, director of engineering science. “He is a towering figure in the field, and an inspiration to classes of Engineering Science students, past, present and future.”

Aho, who earned a bachelor of applied science in engineering physics (now engineering science) from U of T in 1963, is currently the Lawrence Gussman Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at Columbia University.

His many honours include the IEEE John von Neumann Medal and the NEC C&C Foundation C&C Prize. He is also a member of the U.S National Academy of Engineering, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Royal Society of Canada. He is a Fellow of ACM, IEEE, Bell Labs, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 2015, Aho received an honorary degree from U of T and, in 2018, he was inducted into the Engineering Alumni Hall of Distinction at the Engineering Alumni Network Awards.

“The software researchers develop today would not be possible without the fundamental work of Alfred Aho and Jeffrey Ullman. They helped define the modern programming industry, and therefore shaped the very world around us,” says Chris Yip, dean of U of T Engineering. “On behalf of U of T Engineering, my enthusiastic congratulations on this incredibly prestigious recognition. We have long been tremendously proud to call Professor Aho a U of T Engineering alumnus.”

It's the second time in three years that a member of the U of T community has won the prestigious A. M. Turing Award. In 2019, University Professor Emeritus ��Ƶ and two of his colleagues received the award for their pioneering work in artificial intelligence.

U of T expert Omar F. Khan answers COVID-19 vaccine questions

Christopher.Sorensen — Tue, 23 Mar 2021 16:36:23 +0000

U of T expert Omar F. Khan answers COVID-19 vaccine questions

Christopher.Sorensen Tue, 03/23/2021 - 12:36

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A pharmacist prepares a COVID-19 vaccine (photo by Steven Cornfield via Unsplash)

Liz Do

Topic

Our Community

Coronavirus

Institute of Biomedical Engineering

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Vaccines

One year into the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccines are being deployed and administered around the world – with vaccine development, manufacturing and distribution all taking place at record-breaking speed.

But many Canadians continue to have questions about the different vaccines and how they work, particularly as the country races to inoculate citizens amid an increase in infections due to SARS-CoV-2 variants.

Omar F. Khan, an immunoengineering expert and assistant professor at the Institute of Biomedical Engineering in the ��Ƶ’s Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, runs a lab that designs nanotechnology devices that can deliver RNA technology to cells for better disease treatment.

Khan recently spoke to U of T Engineering writer Liz Do about several common concerns and questions around COVID-19 vaccines.

There are four approved vaccines in Canada. How are they different and how do they work?

Two are mRNA vaccines – Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna – and two are viral vector vaccines: Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca. They are different methods of delivering an antigen.

An antigen is a unique protein that is used to sensitize the immune system to a pathogen. This unique antigen is only found on the pathogen and nowhere else in your body. Once the immune system is sensitized to it, the immune system then goes on to make antibodies. Antibodies are specialized protein complexes that float around in your blood and if they ever recognize the antigen, they stick to it. That “sticking” sets off a cascade of signals and the rest of the immune system converges and destroys the pathogen connected to the antigen.

The Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines contain a piece of genetic information in the form of messenger RNA, or mRNA. This molecule is separate from DNA, so they don’t intermix. The mRNA molecule is an instruction set that your body can use to make the antigen.

The viral vector vaccines use a modified virus – not the virus that causes COVID-19, a different one – that has been changed so that instead of carrying instructions to make more of itself, it just carries instructions to make the antigen for the COVID-19 virus.

These vaccines were developed when there was one version of the virus. Now there are variants – how did this come about?

Because we’ve had so many cases of COVID-19, these viruses kept on replicating in people. Every time a virus replicates, there is an opportunity for a mistake to happen – this is a mutation. Most mutations are not favourable (to the virus), but some enable the virus to survive and spread more effectively, and so become a favourable evolutionary event. In this case, a variant emerges that outruns the original version because it can spread more easily and make more copies.

Do we know how effective the vaccines are against new COVID-19 variants?

The antigen that we’re using as part of the vaccine is called a spike protein, which we hope is relatively invariant in that it shouldn’t change too much. So, with these vaccines, we’ve trained the immune system to recognize an earlier version of the spike protein. If the variant has a slightly different version, then the fidelity isn’t quite there.

One way we can overcome this difference is to have a very high immune response by overwhelming the variant virus with antibodies. Booster shots can help maintain a high level of antibodies in your blood and is the reasoning behind the recommendation for a second shot.

What this all ends up meaning: These vaccines can no longer completely prevent disease. However, they can still reduce the severity of disease. We are in the middle of a very dynamic pandemic, where the virus keeps changing.

What this means for the person receiving the vaccine is that you have to be more cognizant of what “efficacy” means. Here, efficacy means a reduction in the severity of disease.

Why is there a public health push to get everyone vaccinated if we’re not completely stopping COVID-19?

There are several reasons. Mass vaccination can slow down the viral replication in the population. That leads to fewer variants, and our vaccines stay more effective. We are preventing the severity of the disease, which means less hospitalization and fewer patients in intensive care. Hence, we do not overwhelm the health-care system. I think the major confusion is that the vaccines are primarily preventing severe disease, and not necessarily completely preventing disease.

Does it matter which vaccine you get?

It doesn’t matter. The goal is to stop viral replication and the creation of new variants. All of these vaccines have shown, through clinical trials, that they will reduce the severity of disease. Get whatever you can get, because we don’t want to be responsible for creating a variant that is even more pathogenic. Let’s all try to fight this.

Some have expressed concerns of health side effects from getting the vaccine. We’ve seen in Europe the suspension of the AstraZeneca vaccine due to reports of blood clots, for example.

It’s good to be concerned and good to ask questions. But let’s help people understand why these things are happening.

Vaccines are a very special case of health-care technology. There’s a special burden on the regulations for vaccines that says, “If you give this to a healthy person and they become sick, we need to figure out if they became sick because of your vaccine, or because people become sick from an unrelated reason” and to decouple the two.

The AstraZeneca vaccine has been widely distributed around the world and administered to millions of people, particularly in the U.K. Of the people vaccinated there, they looked at these potential side effects and the rate at which they were occurring in order to determine if there’s a link.

So when the U.K. did this investigation, they found that the rate of blood clots happening in people was not different than the rate at which it happened in the overall public. Other countries, such as in France and Spain, want to make sure they are making the right call out of an abundance of caution – and that’s understandable and important to be resolved.

These safety procedures are in fact normal; it’s just that the awareness has been amplified because these protocols are under a big magnifying glass.

When do you think Canadians will see a return to something approaching pre-pandemic life, given the rise of variant infections?

If we look at the rate of which vaccines are being shipped, how quickly people can be vaccinated, but then also factoring in how long it takes your body to develop immunity, I think we are looking at 2022. By the time we have enough vaccines to vaccinate all Canadians, we’re already pushing into the fall.

How will mRNA technology change the treatment of diseases and vaccine development going forward?

This is a mosaic of technologies working together. We saw the different rates at which vaccines were developed, manufactured, distributed – not to mention the challenges with temperature-control distribution logistics. These are all important elements that are part of the ecosystem of pathogen preparedness.

I would say that of the more traditional vaccine technologies versus the newer technologies, I don’t think there’s necessarily a silver bullet that will supplant the other. But what this has shown is that we are fortunate to have many more new options and tools that improve vaccine accessibility globally, and hopefully prevent this from happening again.

Toronto’s first student-run Black hackathon goes global

Christopher.Sorensen — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 17:36:18 +0000

Toronto’s first student-run Black hackathon goes global

Christopher.Sorensen Wed, 02/03/2021 - 12:36

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Alana Bailey (left), a third-year U of T engineering student, is a lead organizer of NSBEHacks 2021. Event co-founder and computer science alumna Temisan Iwere (right) remains closely involved (photos by Daria Perevezentsev, courtesy of Temisan Iwere)

Topic

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Faculty of Arts & Science

STEM

Undergraduate Students

As many as 300 high school and university students will have 24 hours to code, design, build, network and learn from mentors at NSBEHacks 2021 this weekend – an event that aims to equalize the footing of Black and other racialized students within science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields.

“Black-facilitated events like these are important because limited opportunities are often afforded specifically to Black students in STEM, as there aren’t many of us,” says Alana Bailey, a third-year student in the ��Ƶ’s Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering who is president of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) U of T chapter and one of the hackathon’s lead organizers.

Founded by U of T computer science alumni Kyra Stephen and Temisan Iwere, as well as Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering alumna Ayan Gedleh, NSBEHacks was first launched in 2019 and is the first Black student-run hackathon within the Greater Toronto Area.

“It was very important to me to make sure that things are easier for incoming Black students in tech,” says Iwere, who continues to be involved with NSBEHacks following graduation. “The technical industry can be very intimidating, especially when you get into certain spaces and realize that you’re the only one who looks like you. It can be an alienating experience.”

This year, NSBEHacks will go beyond the Toronto region. Because the event is taking place virtually due to COVID-19, participants can join from across North America, the Caribbean and Asia.

In addition to sponsors RBC, Accenture, Google, NVIDIA, TD, Bloomberg, Ecobee, Shopify, FDM and EA, the event has also partnered with Major League Hacking (MLH) this year. MLH is the official student hackathon league in North America and is providing free access to software to participants during and after the hackathon.

Keeping students engaged in coding and designing, even after they’ve virtually walked away from this weekend, is how the NSBEHacks team will measure the event’s success.

“We want to see students feeling confident and a sense of belonging. We want to inspire them to get involved with NSBE after applying to STEM programs at U of T and staying in touch with companies from our career fair,” says Bailey. “NSBEHacks is one of the ways to ensure that, going forward, we are building strength in numbers.”

U of T prof uses virtual reality to beam engineering lab into students' homes

Christopher.Sorensen — Wed, 20 Jan 2021 17:49:28 +0000

U of T prof uses virtual reality to beam engineering lab into students' homes

Christopher.Sorensen Wed, 01/20/2021 - 12:49

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The Unit Ops Lab, a key part of U of T's undergraduate training in chemical engineering, is now accessible to students who are studying remotely via VR and 3D simulations (image courtesy of Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering)

Topic

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Undergraduate Students

For more than 70 years, the Unit Ops Lab at the ��Ƶ’s Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering has been a cornerstone for undergraduate training in chemical engineering.

Now, Ariel Chan, an assistant professor, teaching stream, in the department of chemical engineering and applied chemistry, is using virtual reality and 3D simulations to make the lab accessible to students who are studying remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Unit Ops is like medical school for our students,” says Chan, who co-ordinates several lab-based courses built around the facility’s capabilities. “It’s such a major lab, providing students with the practical experiences of an experienced engineer.

“Only a handful of universities in Canada have a facility like this.”

The two-storey laboratory space is located in the Wallberg Building. It features towering industry-scale equipment and provides third-year students with hands-on experience. Unit Ops is where they design and experiment with processes used in a wide range of chemical engineering industries, from bioethanol production to pharmaceutical drug manufacturing.

“Sadly, this term students are missing the opportunity to experience it [in person], to go up and down those stairs – but we can do our best to get it as close as we can, and bridge that curriculum gap,” Chan says.

While students won’t have the opportunity to walk up and down the two-storey lab’s staircase, Ariel Chan says the combination of VR, high-resolution virtual tours and at-home experiments gives students the opportunity to test their skills in an industry environment.

Chan and her teaching assistants are mimicking the Unit Ops experience using VR, high-resolution virtual tours, at-home experiments and 3D simulation/design software. Together, the tools give students a chance to virtually step into the Unit Ops Lab and test their skills in an industry environment.

Using the VR program Labster, students experience a first-person point of view as they replicate an industry-style lab experiment – even putting on a lab coat and gloves.

Students then refer to the Unit Ops website Chan and her team created exclusively for students. The site allows students to connect the dots between what they handled in the virtual lab and what those same pieces of equipment look like within the Unit Ops lab space.

“The team mapped out every inch of the lab to create a fully immersive and comprehensive virtual experience of Unit Ops,” says Chan.

Students are also given pre-collected data that they can compare to similar systems within their household. For example, a regular household drainage pipe can serve as a scaled-down example for studying the upstream and downstream processes of bioethanol production.

A user is instructed to don gloves during a VR experiment in Labster.

“The guiding philosophy for our approach is that engineering is all around us,” says Chan. “If [the students] were [working] in industry, they would have to inspect piping systems to figure out the cause of a blockage. That’s not too different from inspecting your sink pipes.”

The home lab component turns the online instruction into practical learning – whether it’s experimenting with yeast fermentation to learn bioethanol production or studying a kitchen stove to assess heat-transfer effectiveness.

“Sure, you can learn the chemistry, the measurements – but when you turn a valve, how does it feel? The sensory portion is so important,” says Chan.

To ensure students approach each assignment like a practising engineer, they are asked to design a 3D simulation of the system they’re studying and perform the experiment as if they were in industry.

The approach seems to be resonating with students. During the fall term, many shared their home experiments and video presentations on the course’s message boards – and even on TikTok.

“When you do more, and for the greater good, it’s rewarding,” Chan says. “Other universities might just give students data and an assignment, but for our students, the extra work – this whole process – enables them to be better prepared to be engineers.”

U of T marks National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women with virtual event

Christopher.Sorensen — Fri, 04 Dec 2020 19:53:15 +0000

U of T marks National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women with virtual event

Christopher.Sorensen Fri, 12/04/2020 - 14:53

Cutline

Clockwise, from top left: Chris Yip; Alana Bailey, Jennifer Blackbird, Micah Stickel and Marisa Sterling (image courtesy of Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering)

Liz Do

Topic

Our Community

Sexual Violence Prevention & Support Centre

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Indigenous

LGBTQ

National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women

Members from across the ��Ƶ’s three campuses gathered virtually Friday to mark the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women.

On Dec. 6, 1989, a gunman entered an engineering classroom at École Polytechnique in Montreal and murdered 14 female students, injuring another 10 women and four men. The victims were targeted because of their gender. The date of the massacre has become a day of remembrance and action against gender-based violence and discrimination – and each year, the U of T community marks the day with an event at Hart House.

Friday’s tri-campus virtual memorial was led by U of T’s Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering and the Sexual Violence Prevention & Support Centre, in partnership with Hart House.

“Today we are here to remember the past, the 14 women who died from violence,” said Marisa Sterling, assistant dean and director, diversity, inclusion and professionalism at U of T Engineering.

“We are here to acknowledge how far we have come in the present, and we are here to take actions, reimagining a future without violence or aggression towards women within the intersections of many identities.”

While this year’s event was held online because of the pandemic, previous commemorations have involved ceremonies and events on all three U of T campus, including the laying of 14 roses – one for every woman killed. Last year, on the 30th anniversary of the massacre U of T Engineering was among 14 engineering schools from across the country to shine a beam of light  into the sky, from coast to coast.

In 2019, U of T Engineering joined 13 other engineering schools from across the country in shining a beam of light into the sky to mark the 30th anniversary of the tragedy (photo by Roberta Baker)

This year’s virtual ceremony included a performance by Jenny Blackbird, event co-ordinator for the Ciimaan/Kahuwe’ya/Qajaq Indigenous Language Initiative Program at the Centre for Indigenous Studies.

“This a song for all of our sisters, my Indigenous sisters, my kin, and extending out to all the sisters, including transwomen and non-binary. We have a lot of violence pushed up against us,” Blackbird said. “I love you all. This is for you.”

Students from across the university led in reading the names of the 14 women before a moment of silence.

Professor Micah Stickel, acting vice-provost, students, also announced this year’s three recipients of the Award for Scholarly Achievement in Gender-Based Violence, in recognition of U of T students who have shown commitment on issues around gender-based violence and discrimination through research and prevention.

The recipients are:

Ferdinand Lopez of the Women & Gender Studies Institute
Rajpreet Sidhu of the department of human geography at U of T Scarborough
Kanishka Sikri of the Centre for Critical Development Studies at U of T Scarborough

The event culminated in a fireside chat, facilitated by Jennifer Flood and Bristy Chakrabarty of the Sexual Violence Prevention & Support Centre, and featuring panelists Chris Yip, dean of U of T Engineering; Alana Bailey, president of the National Society of Black Engineers U of T Chapter; Tee Duke, assistant director, Indigenous initiatives, at U of T Mississauga’s Indigenous Centre; and, Andi Alhakim, intercultural programs assistant at U of T Mississauga’s International Education Centre.

The conversation highlighted ways in which individuals can call out and take concrete action to end violence against women. The discussions also emphasized the need to centre the narrative around protecting racialized and 2SLGBTQ+ communities and taking steps to prevent violence against them.

“It’s crazy how [violence is] happening to us, Black women, Indigenous women, the most – and yet less focus is on us,” says Bailey. “People need to wake up and not be desensitized. This energy is what makes society look away. To centre the narrative, I think we need to create spaces where we have a voice, spaces where we won’t be shamed, ignored and looked over.”

The group also discussed how non-Black, Indigenous and people of color (Non-BIPOC) U of T students, staff and faculty can commit to taking actions, informed by the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.

“I encourage folks to actually read the report,” says Duke. “It’s going to take some time. It is 1,200 pages with 231 recommendations, but it’s not that we don’t have a roadmap. It comes down to everyone having a responsibility in ending violence.”

Angela Treglia, director of the Sexual Violence Prevention & Support Centre, closed the event with a call to action: “Today we reflect, we remember, but we need to respond. May we all find the courage and strength to take action and speak out against violence against women and may we continue to work for change.”

‘A false sense of security’: Automated vehicle tech can impede driver performance, U of T study finds

Christopher.Sorensen — Tue, 01 Dec 2020 14:20:38 +0000

‘A false sense of security’: Automated vehicle tech can impede driver performance, U of T study finds

Christopher.Sorensen Tue, 12/01/2020 - 09:20

Cutline

A study by researchers at U of T's Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering reveals some in-vehicle displays can lead to drivers being over-reliant on automated systems (photo courtesy of Dengbo He)

Liz Do

Topic

Breaking Research

Artificial Intelligence

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Mechanical & Industrial Engineering

Research & Innovation

Self-Driving Cars

As cars keep getting smarter, automation is taking many tricky tasks –  from reversing to parallel parking –  out of drivers’ hands.

Now, a ��Ƶ study is underscoring the importance of drivers keeping their eyes on the road – even when they are in an automated vehicle, or AV.

Using an AV driving simulator and eye-tracking equipment, Birsen Donmez, a professor in the department of mechanical and industrial engineering in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, and her team studied two types of in-vehicle displays and their effects on the driving behaviours of 48 participants.

The findings, published recently in the journal Accident Analysis & Prevention, revealed that drivers can become over-reliant on AV technology. This was especially true with a type of in-vehicle display the team dubbed “takeover request and automation capability,” or TORAC.

A “takeover request” asks the driver to take vehicle control when automation is not able to handle a situation, while “automation capability” indicates how close the automation is to its limit.

“Drivers find themselves in situations where, although they are not actively driving, they are still part of the driving task – they must be monitoring the vehicle and step in if the vehicle fails,” says Donmez.

“And these vehicles fail – it’s just guaranteed. The technology on the market right now is not mature enough to the point where we can just let the car drive and we go to sleep. We are not at that stage yet.”

Tesla’s AV system, for example, warns drivers every 30 seconds or less when their hands aren’t detected on the wheel. This prompt can support driver engagement, but when the automation fails, driver attention and anticipation can determine whether a traffic accident occurs.

“Even though cars are advertised right now as self-driving, they are still just level two, or partially automated,” saus Dengbo He, a post-doctoral researcher and lead author of the study. “The driver should not rely on these types of vehicle automation.”

In one of the team’s driving scenarios, the participants were given a non-driving, self-paced task meant to mimic common distractions such as reading text messages, while takeover prompts and automation capability information were turned on.

“Their monitoring of the road went way down compared to the condition where these features were turned off,” says Donmez. “Automated vehicles and takeover requests can give people a false sense of security, especially if they work most of the time. People are going to end up looking away and doing something non-driving related.”

The researchers also tested a second in-vehicle display system that added information on surrounding traffic to the data provided by the TORAC system, called STTORAC. These displays showed more promise in ensuring driving safety.

STTORAC provides drivers with ongoing information about their surrounding driving environment, including highlighting potential traffic conflicts on the road. This type of display led to the shortest reaction time in scenarios where drivers had to take control of the vehicle, showing a significant improvement from both the TORAC and the no-display conditions.

“When you’re not driving and aren’t engaged, it’s easy to lose focus. Adding information on surrounding traffic kept drivers better engaged in monitoring and anticipating traffic conflicts,” says He, adding that the key for designers of next-generation AVs will be to ensure systems are designed to keep drivers attentive.

“Drivers should not be distracted, at least at this stage.”

Donmez’s team will next look at the effects of non-driving behaviours on drowsiness while operating an AV.

“If someone isn’t engaged in a non-driving task and is just monitoring the road, they can be more likely to fall into states of drowsiness, which is even more dangerous than being distracted.”

The research was supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

Hands-on virtual labs? U of T Engineering profs get creative with remote learning

Christopher.Sorensen — Thu, 26 Nov 2020 16:21:34 +0000

Hands-on virtual labs? U of T Engineering profs get creative with remote learning

Christopher.Sorensen Thu, 11/26/2020 - 11:21

Cutline

Jennifer Farmer, a professor in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, is using what she calls “kitchen labs” in addition to other virtual tools to create an all-new lab experience for students (photo courtesy of Jennifer Farmer)

Topic

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Undergraduate Students

A camera and a bottle of Gatorade were the key pieces of equipment for a recent virtual lab in Jennifer Farmer’s applied chemistry course.

“We told students that they’d have to determine the amount of food dye in the drink,” explains Farmer, an assistant professor, teaching stream, in the ��Ƶ’s department of chemical engineering and applied chemistry in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering.

Any other year, students would learn to operate a spectrometer to find the answer.

“Well, we don’t have spectrometers at home – or do we?”

During the COVID-19 pandemic, instructors and teaching assistants (TAs) across U of T Engineering have been forced to create new, engaging and equitable ways to conduct labs – a traditionally hands-on and collaborative in-person learning experience – without using on-campus equipment, software or space.

Farmer is using a combination of what she calls “kitchen labs,” simulated lab platforms and data analysis reports to create an all-new lab experience for students. In the case of her recent assignment, students used a camera or smartphone in place of a spectrometer to measure the dye in their Gatorade bottles.

“It was important that the labs were accessible and that students could use what they have on hand at home instead of procuring specialty items and tools,” says Farmer.

Farmer also wants to make sure her students can also build relationships with their peers. For her kitchen labs, she groups students into teams to mimic the interactions that would take place in a lab setting.

“Normally, students will be looking over and going, ‘Oh, it didn’t work for you either? Ok, so is it the chemistry that’s not working?’ and they talk it out to solve it,” she says. “I want to provide that same conversation from their own homes.”

An interactive and user-friendly tool devised by Associate Professor Alis Ekmekci and TA Pouya Mohtat helped move lab work online for students in a second-year Engineering course on vector calculus and fluid mechanics (photo courtesy of Alis Ekmekci)

In AER 210: Vector Calculus and Fluid Mechanics, second-year engineering science students in Alis Ekmekci’s course would typically learn fundamental fluid mechanics concepts by participating in a flow visualization lab.

The activity involves using Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV), an optical flow measurement technique, to analyze data, sketch flow lines and do calculations. In the past, the team used software that runs concurrently with the flow visualization lab equipment on computers inside the laboratory.

When faced with the challenge of moving the lab online, Ekmekci and TA Pouya Mohtat were determined to find a solution to deliver a similar experience remotely.

“We could have just given the students readily analyzed experimental data and asked them to put together a lab report on it, but that would not be very interactive – they need to experience handling data and extracting results,” says Ekmekci, an associate professor in the U of T Institute for Aerospace Studies, or UTIAS.

Mohtat spent the summer developing an interactive and user-friendly tool to help students with the lab exercises on flow visualization. The tool runs on virtual machines in the cloud, making it accessible for students regardless of where they are located.

“What we have built enables students to do interactive exercises on their own time. They can analyze PIV data sets by themselves, run computational flow simulations, and compare experimental and computational results using the user-friendly interactive tools that we have developed for them,” says Mohtat.

Ekmekci hopes that their approach will help other faculty members looking for accessible and interactive exercises for their students.

Chris Bouwmeester, an assistant professor at the Institute of Biomedical Engineering, is looking ahead to the winter term and thinking about how he’ll foster engagement among graduate students in BME 1802: Applying Human Factors to the Design of Medical Devices.

“I’m playing around with a couple of ideas,” Bouwmeester says.

Normally for each lecture, Bouwmeester would bring in different medical devices for students to study and pass around the class.

“My goal was to always put these instruments in students’ hands so they can understand how they work, and how confusing or straightforward these devices can be,” explains Bouwmeester. “To recreate that experience virtually is a tough challenge.”

Inspired by his daughter’s love of the stop-motion animated show Tiny Chef, he says, “I thought, maybe I could do these little stop-motion videos of the instruments I have on hand at home.”

Stop-motion gives students the option of rotating the images or moving them backward and forward, in order to better understand them.

“I could have just filmed them – that would be much easier,” says Bouwmeester. “But if students wanted to pause at a part, the device might look blurry. I wanted to give each movement purpose.”

Another course activity Bouwmeester is working on would allow students to experience what it would be like to administer Naloxone, a medication used to quickly counteract the effects of opioids. Using a simulated version of a Naloxone kit, students time themselves as they open the kits, read the instructions, open the practice vials and inject the drug into an orange.

“The course is about how to redesign devices to be safer and easier to use, so it’s important for students to get to experience using the equipment and to experience the errors that are easy to make,” Bouwmeester says.

Though still in the brainstorming phase, Bouwmeester hopes to translate the experience remotely by mailing out the simulated kits to students, having them film themselves administering the drug and getting other students to watch and observe any errors.

“I’ve had to think harder this year because my philosophy is to have students get that hands-on experience – that was my whole reason for teaching in the Myhal Centre,” says Bouwmeester. “Labs and design classes are all about applying your knowledge, iterating and learning from your mistakes. And that should still be true online.”

Other U of T Engineering professors who are thinking creatively to deliver their lectures and labs include:

Professor Emeritus Joseph C. Paradi and Margarete von Vaight, a trained opera singer, engineering consultant and Faculty of Music alumna, are leveraging music and creativity to deliver a course on entrepreneurship and small business. It includes the voluntary “Dollar Store Challenge,” where students are assigned a fictional case and are tasked to create a musical instrument, costing under $10, for an individual suffering from a physical or mental health issue.
Students in electrical and computer engineering can conduct many of their labs at home, thanks to CPUlator, a free CPU simulator designed and maintained by alumnus Henry Wong. The computer program effectively and efficiently simulates hardware that they would use when learning the fundamentals of how computers work. Wong’s simulator has been used 280,000 times by U of T Engineering students and students at other institutions.
Professor Grant Allen, chair of the department of chemical engineering and applied chemistry, has produced a video series that uses a leaf blower as an example of a fluid mechanics device that uses a pump and transfers momentum. The videos, which have received overwhelmingly positive reactions from students, were produced near his family cottage and feature several cameos from his dog, Layla.

Liz Do

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Hands-on virtual labs? U of T Engineering profs get creative with remote learning