GLOBAL IMPACT - 2020-2021

GLOBAL IMP

2020-2021

ACT

P R E S I D E N T ’ S U P D AT E

“At the dawn of a new decade, it is an opportune

time to reflect on the global challenges that lay ahead and celebrate the

visionaries and innovators who are meeting these

challenges and leading us into a promising future.”

FERIDUN HAMDULLAHPURPRESIDENT AND VICE-CHANCELLOR

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INNOVATING FOR GLOBAL IMPACT / PG 1 A message from the president.

HUMAN-MACHINE INTERACTION / PG 2Technology is augmenting every aspect of our lives and we are relying on machines to do everything from drive our cars to diagnose illness. If we are to responsibly develop intelligent robotics and systems, we must recognize both the limits of machines and the needs of people and our complex society.

NEXT-GENERATION COMPUTING / PG 6While innovators are finding new ways to use big data to improve our lives, others are in a race to protect sensitive data in a future where quantum devices, information and technologies bring both promise and risk.

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC PROSPERITY / PG 10We are at the cusp of the fourth industrial revolution: the digital revolution. The growing adoption of artificial intelligence and technologies is changing our workforce and economy. At the same time, migration is at a record high due to natural and political disruption. So, while millions search for their next home, others are looking for their next job.

SUSTAINABLE PLANET / PG 14Human activity has created a global climate crisis that requires collective and immediate action. As greenhouse gas emissions climb, many search for clean technologies and sustainable energy alternatives. Climate disruption is also intricately connected to our housing, food and water security.

TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN HEALTH / PG 18Global and individual health care continues to be deeply enhanced by technology. In the race to make timely diagnoses and reduce wait times and costs, it’s not just medical doctors who are saving lives: it is also engineers, practitioners, scientists and mathematicians.

TRANSFORMATIONAL DISCOVERIES / PG 22Transformation is borne out of curiosity. The next big breakthrough to rock society will be built on the shoulders of the science that came before it − discoveries that result from an open and curious mind probing the mysteries of the tiniest particles on earth or the vast universe.

“ By connecting imagination with global impact, Waterloo is addressing the changing realities of our society, climate and economy.”

FERIDUN HAMDULLAHPURFERIDUN HAMDULLAHPUR

1

INNOVATING FOR GLOBAL IMPACT

The University of Waterloo has prepared generations of leaders

for a future that promises waves of disruption and great opportunity.

We champion a culture that combines curiosity and risk-taking,

with entrepreneurship and community connections. It is this unique

combination that has encouraged so many Waterloo students,

alumni and faculty to lead the charge in creating a better world.

By connecting imagination with global impact, Waterloo is

addressing the changing realities of our society, climate and economy.

We have a unique perspective on solutions for global challenges that

is shaped by fundamental research excellence and the deep industry

and community partnerships of our renowned entrepreneurship

and co−operative education programs. We encourage researchers and

problem solvers to see beyond conventional boundaries, convening

global interdisciplinary coalitions to advance the needs of our society.

Technology is a critical tool for solving some of the world’s most

pressing challenges, but so too are the research discoveries and

reflective scholarship that lead to positive change. By leveraging

our strengths in technology and the social, economic, biological

and environmental determinants of health, Waterloo will lead in

securing healthy futures for local and global communities.

The Global Impact Report is just a glimpse at some of the solutions

being developed to create a future of human-centred prosperity.

The dawn of a new decade is an opportune time to reflect on the

global challenges that lay ahead and celebrate the visionaries and

innovators who are meeting these challenges and leading us into

a promising future.

FERIDUN HAMDULLAHPURPRESIDENT AND VICE-CHANCELLOR

2 | UNIVERSITY OF WATERLOO

HUMAN- MACHINE INTERACTIONAs the line between human and machine is

increasingly blurry, how should we build and use

technology to advance humanity?

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people globally liv1 IN 10

e with mental health challenges

INSTITUTE FOR HEALTH METRICS AND EVALUATION, 2018

30%OF CANADIANS

with serious mental illness interact with police as their

first encounter with the mental health system

CANADIAN MENTAL HEALTH ASSOCIATION, 2016


HELPING POLICE REACT TO MENTAL HEALTH CRISESIntelligence-driven tech supports both individuals in crisis and the officers assisting them.

DANIEL PEARSON HIRDESALUMNUS, FACULTY OF ARTS (BA ‘95)

CEO AND CO-FOUNDER, HEALTHIM

VELOCITY

Each day across Canada, police officers respond

to emergency calls in which mental health

is a key concern. This can result in complex,

potentially volatile situations where an officer’s

ability to respond effectively is crucial.

According to 2012 Statistics Canada data,

approximately one in five contacts with police

across the country involved a person with a

substance abuse or mental health disorder.

To help address this challenge, University

of Waterloo Psychology alumnus Daniel

Pearson Hirdes and Computer Science alumnus

Daniel MacKenzie founded HealthIM to equip

officers with better understanding of mental

illness and how to respond.

The intelligent platform allows officers to digitally record their encounters with the public

and send information to their partners in health-care organizations. The evidence-based

mental health assessment also uses an algorithm to predict an individual’s risk of harm.

The goal is to ensure that with the right information, officers will take the most empathetic

steps to support people with mental health concerns.

In the past, officers would write down their observations in a notepad, which led to

“a lack of standardization between how different officers might respond to these calls,”

Pearson Hirdes says.

“Providing accurate information can go a long way to providing better care for the

individuals involved, so everyone understands the situation in the same terms.”

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Pearson Hirdes and MacKenzie

founded HealthIM in 2012 while they

were both students at Waterloo. After

winning $25,000 at Velocity’s pitch

competition in 2015, they moved into

Waterloo’s Velocity incubator, Canada’s

most productive startup incubator, until

they outgrew the space in 2017.

Today, the platform is being used

in 21 police services and RCMP

detachments in Ontario, Manitoba

and Saskatchewan. In the upcoming

year, more are coming online in British

Columbia and North Carolina.

Among them is the police service in

Brantford, Ontario, which receives between

2,500 and 3,000 emergency calls a year −

or seven to 10 calls a day − in which mental

health is a contributing factor, according to

Geoff Nelson, chief of police.

Although his officers were already

receiving a great deal of mental health-

related training from specialists in

their community, Nelson says the

HealthIM software has supplemented

this knowledge in unique ways.

“As the officers began using the platform,

they became more comfortable with

the terminology,” he says. “Just by virtue

of using the application, I think their

knowledge and understanding of mental

health increased.”

Officers can use HealthIM from their

workstations or mobile devices, and

they are prompted to answer a series of

structured questions about the individual

in crisis. The platform provides detailed

explanations for clinical language used

in the questions, to ensure accurate

understanding. Pearson Hirdes says this is

especially important given that community

mental health agencies, doctors, nursing

staff, hospitals and police officers in the field all

use different terminology to describe behaviours

they observe during mental health crisis calls.

Once questions are answered, the tool employs

algorithms to calculate the likelihood that an individual

will harm themselves, harm others or fail to care for

themselves. Officers can use these results to inform

their on-scene decision-making about the best next step

for that person, be it connecting them to support services

or taking them to a hospital for psychiatric support.

MANMEET MAGGU ALUMNUS, FACULTY OF ENGINEERING

(BASC ’13)

CO-FOUNDER, TREXO ROBOTICS

ROBOTIC EXOSKELETON HELPS CHILDREN TAKE THEIR FIRST STEPS Manmeet Maggu remembers being a fourth-year University of Waterloo student when his nephew, Praneit, was diagnosed with cerebral palsy − an illness that affects muscle tone and motor skills. While the family braced for the reality that Praneit may never take his first steps, Maggu put his mechatronic skills to work and launched Trexo Robotics, a wearable solution for kids living with mobility challenges. “We watched Praneit take his first steps,” Maggu recalls. “That was the proudest moment of my life.”

WATCH HOW TREXO ROBOTICS HAS ENGINEERED AN EXOSKELETON FOR KIDS:

uwaterloo.ca/stories/trexo

http://uwaterloo.ca/stories/trexo


NEXT-GENERA

TIONCOM

PUTINGHow do we securely leverage promising

new computing technologies and big data

to solve global problems?

How do we securely leverage promising

new computing technologies and big data

to solve global problems?

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MINING IOT DATA FOR COMMUNITY PUBLIC HEALTHWaterloo lab turns remote sensor data into public health information.

PLINIO MORITAPROFESSOR, FACULTY OF

APPLIED HEALTH SCIENCES

DIRECTOR, UBIQUITOUS HEALTH TECHNOLOGY LAB

SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH AND HEALTH SYSTEMS

WATERLOO CYBERSECURITY AND PRIVACY INSTITUTE

In Mongolia’s capital city of Ulaanbaatar,

air pollution data is being collected by

air quality sensors.

Here in North America, many houses

have smart thermostats that work with

sensors to adjust the room temperatures

based on whether the room is occupied.

Globally, millions of people use devices

such as Fitbits to monitor heart rate during

workouts. In fact, almost all of today’s

devices − even blood pressure monitors or

weight scales − are wirelessly transmitting

a vast amount of information to servers

all over the world for various applications.

It has become a treasure trove of data.

But surprisingly, all of this data from our

Internet of Things (IoT) has been largely

untapped in terms of public health usage.

Plinio Morita wants to change that.

Morita is the director of the Ubiquitous

Health Technology Lab (UbiLab) at the

University of Waterloo and is helping

health organizations and governments

find ways to use data to develop better

public health services.

“Most of my projects are focused on

tapping into existing data and how to

leverage the wealth of data that is already

out there,” Morita says.


One project, in collaboration with UNICEF Mongolia, involves working with air pollution

data from sensors that have been deployed in hundreds of locations in Ulaanbaatar.

Morita’s Waterloo lab has a software platform that can send requests for information

to these sensors to gather the data on air quality and then correlate it with other health

information. It will help answer questions such as: How did air quality affect the use

of emergency health services? How did it affect student cognitive performance in the

schools? How did it affect maternal and child health?

Another project involves a partnership with Ecobee, a Canadian company that is

a leader in making smart thermostats that can sense temperature and occupancy

in different rooms of a house.

“We can use the occupancy data to quantify indoor motion and correlate that with

levels of physical activity and quality of sleep,” Morita explains.

Anonymized data from personal wearable devices such as Fitbit could also be put to use,

Morita adds. If public officials could mine that anonymous data and extract information,

they could use it to assess a fitness program or develop new public health interventions.

When Morita previously worked as a research scientist at the Centre for Global eHealth

Innovation, he realized that although there has been a proliferation of wearable devices

to monitor heart rate, blood pressure and other vital signs in order to help individual

patients stay healthy, the bigger picture of how this data can inform public health

policies and services was being missed. That inspired his current research.

“We want to look at the data at the country level and take a more global view,”

Morita says.

UbiLab’s software platform has typically used statistical methods to analyze the data.

Recently, it has also started using machine learning, a branch of artificial intelligence.

“When you are analyzing massive amounts of real-time data, machine learning

is actually a better method for working with that kind of data. So recently, I have

MEET THE LAWYER DISRUPTING HER PROFESSION Grossman is a practising attorney in New York, but her ground-breaking work has some people in the legal community calling her the most dangerous lawyer in America. “Law is not a particularly innovative field,” Grossman says. “It’s based on precedent − looking backwards at what we did yesterday − so it’s slow to evolve and change.” But her research and advocacy on technology-assisted review is changing that and transforming one of the world’s oldest professions.

LEARN HOW AI IS MAKING LEGAL REVIEW MORE EFFECTIVE AND EFFICIENT:uwaterloo.ca/stories/ai-law

http://uwaterloo.ca/stories/ai-law

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been hiring more students with a

background in machine learning.”

All of this has to be done with privacy and

consent being top of mind, so Morita’s lab

is also developing a consent management

platform using blockchain. The goal is to

more clearly enable people to see who is

requesting their data, and for what purposes,

so they can control what they want to share

and for what purpose.

Morita says this is becoming increasingly

important because the European Union

(EU) has already enacted the General Data

Protection Regulation that governs data

protection and privacy in the EU. In the

future, companies that gather this type

of data will need to be in compliance with

that law, and other countries may soon

follow similar guidelines.

Ultimately, Morita hopes that the

wealth of data in our IoT world can

be used for public good by making

health-care systems more efficient and

responsive to people’s needs.

“We want to create an impact and we want

to make sure that whatever we’re developing,

it will make a difference in Canada and the

world,” he says.

MAURA R. GROSSMANPROFESSOR, FACULTY OF MATHEMATICS

DIRECTOR OF WOMEN IN COMPUTER SCIENCE, DAVID R. CHERITON SCHOOL OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

30 BILLION IoT devices worldwide

in 2020

STATISTA, 2019

17%OF COUNTRIESreported having a

strategy for regulating the use of big data in

health sectors

WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION, 2015

MAURA R. GROSSMANPROFESSOR, FACULTY OF MATHEMATICS


SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC PROSPERITY

As our world becomes increasingly connected,

how do we ensure an equitable transformation that

builds community and prosperity for all?

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC PROSPERITY

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2 MILLION shortfall in alternative

manufacturing jobs by 2025

WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM, 2019

12.5% growth in the

3D printing industry expected in 2020

DELOITTE, 2018


TRAINING THE MANUFACTURING WORKFORCE OF TOMORROWWaterloo lab helps fill industry demand for additive manufacturing skills.

MIHAELA VLASEAPROFESSOR, FACULTY OF ENGINEERING

ASSOCIATE RESEARCH DIRECTOR, MULTI-SCALE ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING LAB

Grace Kurosad reaches into a large 3D metal

printing machine that uses robotic arms and

lasers to build metal parts, layer by layer, from

a powder substrate.

It’s a high-tech skill. Wearing full personal protective

equipment to keep her from breathing any of the

metal powder, Kurosad has become something of

machine whisperer. She keeps the sophisticated

parts humming along in the Multi-Scale Additive

Manufacturing (MSAM) lab at the University of

Waterloo, where she now works full time.

The MSAM lab is Canada’s largest academic-based

research and development facility in metal additive manufacturing. It has every class of state-of-

the-art 3D metal printing machinery, including custom 3D printers that work with composites

such as graphene, polymers and ceramics.

Kurosad has found a whole new career in additive manufacturing through the lab.

She previously worked as a technician at smartphone maker BlackBerry and subsequently

at wearable device maker Thalmic Labs in Waterloo. But she wanted a career with long-term

potential and she saw it in additive manufacturing.

“You can see how it has a lot of potential for the future,” Kurosad says. “It’s exciting to see,

for example, a part for a human body being built. That’s why I joined this team. I will

never get bored.”

With the decline of traditional factories in recent decades, few young people think about

careers in making parts. Instead, they see the future in software or maybe robotics. Now,

with faster and better 3D printing that can custom-make durable parts in one piece without

the expense of the tooling, a whole new chapter in manufacturing has begun.

“Additive manufacturing is reshaping the way manufacturing looks,” says Mihaela Vlasea,

a professor in mechanical and mechatronics engineering and associate director at the MSAM

lab at Waterloo.

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Vlasea is part of the MSAM team

that includes research director Ehsan

Toyserkani and managing director

Vladimir Paserin. The lab now has a

complement of more than 60 people

including faculty, postdoctoral fellows

and research associates, technicians,

graduate and undergraduate students.

In addition, more than 15 affiliated

faculty and their students across campus

engage in research activities.

One of Vlasea’s PhD students, Gitanjali

Shanbhag, is researching biomedical

applications to advance health care.

“The role of additive is becoming

increasingly important in health care

through its utilization in implant design,

surgical planning, therapeutic delivery and

tissue engineering,” Shanbhag explains.

In addition to doing research and

development with industry partners,

the lab is developing the talent pool

to fill the gap in those industries.

Many companies in the aerospace

sector, for example, are scaling up their

additive manufacturing production.

New companies are also setting up shop

to produce parts and services for their

customer base. But finding people with

the right skills is not easy.

“There is a huge need for people with

these skills,” Vlasea says. “We are finding

that we can barely hold on to our students

as they finish their degrees. Sometimes

they leave for industry and come back

to finish their degrees part-time.”

The MSAM lab strives for strong

research programs and courses in

support of graduate programs in

additive manufacturing and runs regular

workshops benefiting professionals

working in area industries. The lab

has collaborations with more than 22

industry partners. Industries often send

their engineers to learn about the latest

developments and then replicate what

the lab is doing on their factory floors.

People tend to think of 3D printing as a simple

matter of pushing a button to have a perfect

part pop out, but it’s enormously complex.

“It takes a lot of effort to be able to define all

of the little levers in the process to generate

quality parts,” Vlasea says.

Additive manufacturing requires multidisciplinary

skills and integrates everything from materials

science and product design to robotics and

computational data analytics, she says. Even

areas such as machine learning and computer

vision are part of it.

“It’s bringing more excitement back into

manufacturing, especially for this young

generation of students who live in the digital

space,” Vlasea says.

ANNA KUEPFER STUDENT, FACULTY OF APPLIED

HEALTH SCIENCES

CO-FOUNDER, SHECYCLE

GREENHOUSE AT ST. PAUL’S UNIVERSITY COLLEGE

CONCEPT SCIENCE

BREAKING THE CYCLE OF POVERTY Despite menstruation being a natural aspect of human life, at least 500 million women globally still lack adequate facilities for menstrual hygiene management. “Menstrual hygiene is such a large determining factor for a girl’s trajectory in life,” Kuepfer explains. “If she’s missing school because of her period, it can lower her level of education and lead to earlier pregnancy, in addition to all of the other health risks that infections are causing.”

READ HOW SHECYCLE IS KEEPING GIRLS HEALTHY AND IN SCHOOL WITH A SANITARY PAD:

uwaterloo.ca/stories/shecycle

http://uwaterloo.ca/stories/shecycle


SUSTAINABLE PLANET

How will we navigate the social, economic

and geopolitical changes required to sustain

our future on Earth?

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90% OF GLACIAL ICE

is found in Antarctica

WORLD WILDLIFE FUND, 2019

GLOBAL SEA LEVELS

ARE RISING 3.3 millimeters annually

NASA, 2019


EVERYTHING IS GOING TO CHANGETrekking the ends of the Earth to set a timetable for our climate emergency.

CHRISTINE DOWPROFESSOR, FACULTY OF ENVIRONMENT

CANADA RESEARCH CHAIR IN GLACIER HYDROLOGY AND ICE DYNAMICS

WATER INSTITUTE

For eight days straight, researcher Christine

Dow and her team dragged a sled-mounted

radar system roughly 85 kilometres across

the frozen Antarctic. The hard-earned data

they collected has Dow convinced the

Antarctic Ice Sheet is destabilizing faster

than anyone thought.

“It’s scary,” says the Scotland-born Canada

Research Chair in Glacier Hydrology and

Ice Dynamics at the University of Waterloo.

“The West Antarctic was predicted to take

1,000 years to collapse. Now, we’re talking

a few hundred years.”

Understanding the danger posed by melting polar regions takes a combination of physics

knowledge, computational chops and a heavy dose of imagination. Dow does the work not

everyone is prepared to do. She travels to the coldest places on Earth collecting raw data and

modelling that information to understand how the subglacial hydrological and ice-ocean

systems evolve as a result of climate change.

The familiar shape of the Antarctic we’ve seen on maps since childhood betrays the

landmass beneath. “The landmass is in the middle of the Antarctic. Massive ice shelves

cling to its edge holding back the ice on land. If those shelves go, that land ice accelerates

into the ocean,” Dow says.

Her radar sled uncovers information deep below the ice to paint a picture of how warming

ocean water is eroding that anchor ice and cleaving ice shelves at an accelerated rate, which

significantly raises sea levels.

“Because we’ve only recently had the computing power to run these kinds of models,

and we’re still making these new discoveries about ice shelves, the more we find out,

the more unstable the whole system seems to be,” Dow says. “Is this going to collapse

in the next 200 years? It might.”

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This threat of collapse has attracted

climate researchers from around the

world to the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.

The area is experiencing an uncanny

confluence of climate-related changes.

“The data we’re gathering isn’t about

whether it’s collapsing, it’s how fast,”

Dow adds.

In 2018, the world jolted awake to the

dangers of climate change when the UN

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate

Change (IPCC) released its report giving

us a 12-year timetable to avoid irreversible

climate impacts.

That timetable might be optimistic.

“We’re gaining new information all the

time so the IPCC estimates are likely to

get even more serious over time both

due to the reducing timetable and our

increased knowledge,” she says. “The worst

case we’re modelling is 12.5 metres sea

level rise globally. That’s total devastation

of the planet.”

Dow is a scientist first and foremost.

She joined the University of Waterloo

from a previous position with NASA,

but knowing what she knows has left her

no choice but to be an advocate as well.

“Imagine having to relocate every person

living in a coastal city in 100 years,” she

explains. “Sea-level rise means salt water

infiltrating our ground water. It means

climate refugees.”

Dow stresses that all climate scientists

need to do a better job communicating

the danger. We all have a role in our current

climate emergency. For Dow, it’s using her gifts

as a scientist and her courage to spend months

in the most inhospitable environments to get

the raw information we need to accurately

determine how fast we need to act.

“I am hesitant to say it’s this or that many years,

but if it’s not already too late it will be soon

if we don’t act. Regardless, we can be certain

though that everything is going to change.”

ANGELA CARTER PROFESSOR, FACULTY OF ARTS

FELLOW, BALSILLIE SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

THE POLITICS OF LEAVING FOSSIL FUELS IN THE GROUNDReducing fossil fuel combustion is a top priority for climate policy, but environmental legislation is often contested, fraught with tensions between environmental impact and economic imperatives. Even so, some nations are making global history by adopting “keep it in the ground” policy. “They are setting a new moral standard by saying that fossil fuels are so damaging to the global environment that we should not touch them,” Carter says. Is this the future of climate policy?

LEARN ABOUT THE POLITICAL CONDITIONS NECESSARY TO WIND DOWN FOSSIL FUEL EXTRACTION:

uwaterloo.ca/stories/oil

http://uwaterloo.ca/stories/oil


TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN HEALTH

How will advancements in new technologies and

processes prevent disease and enable medical professionals

to improve the life-saving care they provide?

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MATH IS THE NEW MICROSCOPEWaterloo researcher is bridging math and medicine to develop future scientists.

ANITA LAYTONASSOCIATE DEAN,

RESEARCH AND INTERNATIONAL, FACULTY OF MATHEMATICS

CANADA 150 CHAIR IN MATHEMATICAL BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE

Breakthroughs in technology and

computing are changing the way

researchers approach medicine. Early

scientists wielded the revolutionary tools

of their time, such as the microscope,

to understand human health. Today,

researchers increasingly use math as a

microscope to understand biology and

medicine, dictating the need for scientists

to navigate between the worlds of

computations and medicine comfortably.

Inspired by the unfortunate fact that

diabetes runs in her family, University

of Waterloo professor Anita Layton is one

such scientist. She uses her interdisciplinary

background to find better drugs for people

who have diabetes and other diseases.

“The discovery of the microscope in the

late 17th century revealed otherwise

invisible processes and revolutionized

biology,” Layton says. “Now, mathematics

has the potential to do the same.”

Layton, the Canada 150 Research Chair

in Mathematical Biology and Medicine,

holds positions in Applied Mathematics,

Computer Science, Pharmacy and

Biology. Her research team engages

in interdisciplinary research, building

computer models to simulate the effects of

various drugs and applying mathematical

techniques to analyze clinical data.


Layton and a group of fellow researchers are currently working to prevent the

development of complications associated with diabetes. They want to limit the impact

of problems caused by diabetes, then try to prevent the complications altogether −

and hopefully one day, take steps toward preventing the disease.

In one project, her team simulated the effect of a new diabetes drug that lowers

blood sugar levels by increasing glucose excretion by the kidney. This simulation

allowed them to explain why that drug lowers not just blood sugar but blood pressure

as well, even among patients whose blood sugar fails to drop enough because of

impaired kidney function.

In another project, Layton’s team developed separate blood pressure models for men

and women, and used model simulations to show how (and why) some different blood

pressure medications are more effective for men, and some are more effective for women.

“Animal experiments and clinical trials can tell us whether a drug works or not.

Computational models can explain why that drug works,” Layton says. “Furthermore,

through the combination of computational modelling and machine learning, precision

medicine will become increasingly more common. For this to become a reality, we

need a new generation of scientists well versed in both computations and biology.”

Precision medicine allows doctors to select treatments that are most likely to help

individual patients based on a genetic understanding of their disease. The ultimate

goal is, for example, to glean from the genetic makeup of a patient with diabetes

what complications will befall that patient. Will they develop retinopathy or diabetic

nephropathy, or will they need a foot amputation?

As associate dean, research and international, in the Faculty of Mathematics, Layton

has encouraged her math and computer science colleagues to apply their expertise to

SCALE-UP HELPS PRO-ATHLETES (AND ENTREPRENEURS) STAY IN THE GAME After early success with pro sports teams in the U.S., Roeper returned to Waterloo region to grow her laser therapy company. “We need larger [HealthTech] companies in Canada,” she says. “We have more and more startups, but … they generally end up being acquired by American companies.” Penta Medical is part of the Medical Innovation Exchange, Canada’s first industry-led hub dedicated to helping HealthTech startups scale in Canada.

WATCH HOW PENTA MEDICAL IS LEADING A HEALTHTECH REVOLUTION IN CANADA:

uwaterloo.ca/stories/penta

http://uwaterloo.ca/stories/penta

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medicine. She works with the Office of

Research at Waterloo to host industry

mixers, in part to facilitate partnerships

between Waterloo math researchers and

the health industry.

Layton also makes sure her graduate

students develop into outstanding

mathematicians whose research is

grounded in real biology. The students

interact with Layton’s collaborators, many

of whom are physiologists and clinicians.

Open questions in biology or medicine

motivate the students’ research projects,

and they present their research findings

at conferences.

“It’s important that the next generation

of scientists have the know-how of

computational techniques, skills and the

necessary knowledge of medicine,” Layton

says. “Math and medicine are not a natural

intersection, so we need more specialized

training programs to produce the future

generation of scientists who can comfortably

walk in the computational world and the

medical world.”

ALEXA ROEPERFORMER STUDENT, FACULTY OF SCIENCE

CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, PENTA MEDICAL

ACCELERATOR CENTRE

VELOCITY

5,000 DRUGS

on the market with 1,000 known

side effects

STANFORD UNIVERSITY, 2018

1 IN 10 CANADIANS

has kidney disease; that’s 4 million people

NATIONAL KIDNEYFOUNDATION, 2017

ALEXA ROEPERFORMER STUDENT, FACULTY OF SCIENCE


TRANSFORMATIONAL

DISCOVERIES How do we continue to encourage

the curious to further our understanding

of how the world works?

How do we continue to encourage

the curious to further our understanding

of how the world works?

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The M87 black hole lies

55 MILLION LIGHT-YEARS FROM EARTH

NASA, 2019

This supermassive black hole is

6.5 BILLION TIMES THE MASS

OF THE SUN NASA, 2019


UNMASKING A MONSTERThe historic first image of a black hole is just the beginning of a journey into the unknown.

AVERY BRODERICKPROFESSOR, FACULTY OF SCIENCE

PERIMETER INSTITUTE FOR THEORETICAL PHYSICS

WATERLOO CENTRE FOR ASTROPHYSICS

When Avery Broderick initially saw the first

image from the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT),

he thought it was too good to be true.

After playing a critical role in the project since

its inception in 2005, Broderick was staring at

his ultimate quarry: a picture-perfect observation

of a supermassive black hole in another galaxy.

Not only was this first image sweet reward

for the dedicated global effort to make

the impossible possible, it was a beautiful

confirmation of Broderick’s predictions

and the 100-year-old theories of gravity

they are based upon.

“That first image was so good that I thought it was a test − it had to be a trial run,”

Broderick says. “It’s a beautiful ring shape that’s exactly the right size. In fact, it looks

very similar to the images [of theoretical models] we included in proposals for the EHT.”

In 2019, the global collaboration showcased the first image of the supermassive black

hole in the core of the massive elliptical galaxy M87. The ring shape Broderick describes

is the bright emissions from the hot gasses immediately surrounding the colossal maw

of a supermassive black hole’s event horizon. For Broderick, a professor at University of

Waterloo and the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, and a key member of the

international EHT collaboration, this wasn’t just an image that proved his theoretical models

correct. It was the beginning of a historic journey into the unknown, with potentially

revolutionary consequences that will reverberate through science and society as a whole.

The EHT is an international network of many radio telescopes around the world,

from the Atacama Desert to the South Pole. By working together, they created a

virtual observatory as wide as our planet.

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“This is a project that has a wide breadth

of collaboration, geographically − you can’t

build an Earth-sized telescope without

an Earth-sized collaboration − but also

in expertise, from the engineers who

build these advanced telescopes, to the

astronomers who work on the day-to-

day and the theorists who inspire their

observations,” Broderick says.

More than a century ago, Albert Einstein

formulated his theory of general relativity,

a theoretical framework that underpins

how our universe works, including how

event horizons should look. Black holes

are the embodiment of general relativity

at its most extreme, and event horizons

are a manifestation of where space-time

caves in on itself.

Physics has some key unresolved problems

that may be answered by the EHT, one of

which is the nature of gravity itself. Simply

put, gravity does not jibe with our current

understanding of other fundamental forces

and particles that underpin all matter in

the universe. By stress-testing Einstein’s

theories right at the edge of a black hole’s

event horizon, the EHT will provide

physicists with the ultimate laboratory

to better understand gravity, the force

that drives the formation of stars, planets

and the evolution of our universe.

Once we truly understand this

fundamental force, the impact could be

revolutionary. “Gravity is the key scientific

problem facing physics today, and no one

fully understands the ramifications of

what understanding gravity fully are

going to be,” Broderick says.

As the scientific benefits of observing

supermassive black holes are becoming

clear, Broderick points out that the impact

on society could also be seismic.

“I would hope that an image like this

will galvanize a sense of exploration −

an exploration of the mind and that of the

universe,” he says. “I feel incredibly privileged

to be a part of this story of exploration − the

human story of understanding the universe

we inhabit and using that understanding to

improve our lives.”

And this stunning confirmation is only

the first chapter.

“We had to start somewhere. M87 represents

the first end-to-end exercise of the entire

EHT collaboration, from data taking to data

interpretation,” Broderick says. “The next

exercise will happen considerably faster.

This is only the beginning.”

YUANMING SHU ALUMNUS, FACULTY OF

ENVIRONMENT (PHD ’15)

CO-FOUNDER, ECOPIA

MAPPING THE UNKNOWN PARTS OF OUR PLANETWith GPS so readily available on our phones and in our cars, it’s easy to forget that we’ve only scratched the surface of digital mapping. Ecopia’s breakthrough machine-learning algorithm is the mapping solution desperately needed by governments and industry working in developing nations to deliver services from road repair to vaccines. “If Google Maps is the first generation of digital mapping, we are creating the second generation,” Shu says.

READ HOW ECOPIA IS PAINTING AN INFORMATION-RICH PICTURE OF OUR WORLD:

uwaterloo.ca/stories/ecopia

http://uwaterloo.ca/stories/ecopia

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27

ELEVATING THE BEST PARTS OF

HUMANITY

PHILIP BEESLEY PROFESSOR, FACULTY OF ENGINEERING

SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE

LIVING ARCHITECTURE SYSTEMS GROUP

WATERLOO INSTITUTE FOR SUSTAINABLE ENERGY

Philip Beesley is a multidisciplinary

artist, academic and architect.

The cover image is of Beesley’s

art installation titled Epiphyte

Spring, a responsive installation

that creates an intimate experience

between the artwork, space

and individual. On this page

is Astrocyte, a collaborative

installation that explores next-

generation lightweight structure

systems. Both sculptures include

networks of simple computational

devices and sensors that register our

presence and respond − generating

gentle movement and a sense of

breathing, ambient architecture.

Combining media art, architecture,

engineering, mechatronics and

synthetic biology, and working with

many collaborators, Beesley’s work

is a beautiful illustration of the

innovation possible when we look

beyond disciplines and encourage

intersectionality. The University

of Waterloo is committed to

interdisciplinary solutions that

are − like Beesley’s work −

responsive, imaginative and

committed to a future that

elevates the best parts of our

shared humanity.


IMPACT BY THE NUMBERSThe University of Waterloo is a critical hub where talent, world-class research

and entrepreneurial spirit come together to imagine bold ideas and inspire

innovation. We are proud to be leading the charge to create a better world.

Get to know

CANADA’S MOST INNOVATIVE UNIVERSITY

DRIVING ECONOMIC IMPACT

$2.3 BILLION IN REVENUE and 7,500 jobs generated by

Waterloo entrepreneurship

programs in the last decade

DELOITTE CANADA, 2019

#13 UNIVERSITY IN THE WORLD

for social and economic impact, UN sustainability development goals

TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION UNIVERSITY IMPACT RANKINGS, 2019

19% OF TECH FOUNDERS in Canada graduated from Waterloo

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO IMPACT CENTRE, 2019

IMPACT BY THE NUMBERS

29

DEVELOPING TALENT FOR THE FUTURE

$525 MILLIONin global employer gains from employment of

WATERLOO CO-OP STUDENTSin 2018

DELOITTE CANADA, 2019

This represents an average $2 return for every $1 invested by these employers in co-op student earnings

#1 IN CANADA for employer-student

connections

QS GRADUATE EMPLOYABILITYRANKING, 2019

TOP UNIVERSITY among corporate recruiters since 2014

NATIONAL BRAND AND REPUTATION SURVEY

RESEARCH FOR GLOBAL CHALLENGES

$258 MILLION in research funding from public and private sources

2018/19

CANADA’S #1 RESEARCH UNIVERSITY for 12 consecutive years

RESEARCH INFOSOURCE, 2019

74 Canada Research Chairs,

5 Killam Prize Winners,

1 Nobel Laureate

2019/20

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UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 200 UNIVERSITY AVE. W., WATERLOO, ON, CANADA N2L 3G1

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GLOBAL IMPACT - 2020-2021