U of T engineer Milica Radisic (IBBME/ChemE) has won one of six E.W.R. Steacie Memorial Fellowships.

The competitive and prestigious fellowship is given by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Council of Canada (NSERC) to enhance the career development of outstanding and highly promising university faculty who are earning a strong international reputation for original research.

Radisic will hold the fellowship, which comes with a $250,000 research grant, for two years.

Appointed in the Department of Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry (ChemE) and the Institute for Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering (IBBME), Radisic is a tissue engineer working on using stem cells to grow new organs. Her work focuses on creating samples of both healthy and diseased human heart tissue to use as models for drug discovery and testing, though she ultimately hopes to see stem cells used to replace heart tissue. Her team recently discovered a way to create beating heart cells from stem cells using electrical pulses to mimic the heart rate of fetal humans (the study was published in Nature Methods).

Radisic, who accepted the Steacie on behalf of all the recipients at a ceremony in Ottawa, thanked NSERC for investing in projects that require long-term vision and commitment.

“Let me draw on my own research as an example,” she said. “Every year, nearly one million people in North America suffer from myocardial infarction, known as heart attacks. It is thanks to NSERC’s support that my laboratory is able to pioneer new types of bio-engineering approaches for creating heart tissue and vasculature in the lab, that could one day be used to mend your heart, mend the hearts of your loved ones, and those of many generations to come.”

“Professor Radisic is pushing the boundaries of science with her ambitious and creative work,” said Professor Paul Young (CivE), U of T’s vice-president (research and innovation). “I’m delighted to see her accomplishments recognized with such a prestigious award.”

Radisic, who also holds the Canada Research Chair in Functional Cardiovascular Tissue Engineering, was recently named a scientist to watch by Scientist Magazine, and holds a Connaught Innovation Award, one of U of T’s leading internal research awards.

“Milica Radisic’s groundbreaking work on cardiovascular tissue engineering has the potential to revolutionize treatment for the millions of people worldwide affected by cardiovascular disease,” said Cristina Amon, Dean of the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering. “I offer my heartfelt congratulations to Milica for this remarkable recognition and thank the selection committee of the Steacie Prize for providing her with this fellowship to advance her research program.“

It was a unique collaboration between prominent business leaders and U of T Engineering students, who gathered to discuss a burning question: What do engineering students think about leadership in their field?

This month, U of T’s Institute for Leadership Education in Engineering (ILead) brought together 20 senior leaders from engineering-focused companies to engage for the first time with 18 graduate and undergraduate students on their future as engineers.

The conversation between industry leaders like Colin Anderson, CEO of Ontario Power Authority, and Elaine Campbell, President of AstraZeneca Canada, and students focused on mentorship and the demand for engineers to lead multidisciplinary teams.

The message from all involved was loud and clear: leadership development cultivates better students today and better engineers in the workforce tomorrow.

“The CEOs were totally engaged and nodding their heads when students spoke; it was clear that our experiences as students mattered to them,” said Lobna El Gammal (ChemE 1T4), whose fourth-year thesis focuses on leadership and the PEY experience. “I was given a platform to say how important leadership education is to me and to learn from these accomplished business people.”

ILead Director, Professor Doug Reeve (ChemE), who hosted the event, believes that U of T Engineering’s leadership programs help to distinguish it as a centre of excellence.

“We have a bold vision for the 21st century engineer,” said Professor Reeve. “By giving students opportunities to grow in areas critical to their success, such as authentic self-leadership, team skills and organizational savvy, U of T Engineering is preparing a generation of engineers to tackle the world’s greatest challenges.”

ILead is a unique hub for leadership learning that offers academic courses, certificates and department-based programs to all U of T Engineering students.

The Institute will find its new home in the Centre for Engineering Innovation & Entrepreneurship (CEIE), a dynamic new environment that will foster creativity and inspire 21st-century learning and innovation. The CEIE is set to break ground later this year.

To view student reactions to the event, please visit the ILead YouTube channel.

Professor Grant Allen, Chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry, is this year’s recipient of the LeSueur Memorial Award, an honour presented by The Chemical Institute of Canada that recognizes the technical excellence in either a university/research institute or industrial setting in Canada.

Professor Allen’s area of research is environmental bioprocess engineering, with particular application to the treatment of aqueous and gaseous emissions and in adding value to wastes by utilizing them for the production of energy, materials and chemicals. He received considerable support and collaborated with the Pulp and Paper industry and led several environmental research consortia involving both faculty and students from a range of disciplines and industrial partners from Canada and abroad (e.g. USA, Brazil, Japan, Sweden, Finland and New Zealand).

Professor Allen’s applied research in the areas of waste treatment technologies has seen significant shifts in sector process approaches, such as minimization of organochlorine contaminants, use of biofiltration for air emissions, and the emergence of anaerobic digestion as a viable, large-scale solution to pulp and paper effluent treatment. Most recently, he has focused on using bioprocessing to produce value-added materials and energy from waste, including the development of algae biofilm bioreactors to generate biofuel from carbon dioxide and wastewater, and extracting adhesives and surfactants from waste biosludge.

Adel S. Sedra, professor and former chair of The Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, has been appointed to the Order of Ontario for 2013. The appointees were announced January 23 and invested by the Honourable David C. Onley, Lieutenant Governor of Ontario, at a ceremony at Queen’s Park.

Professor Sedra was selected for his distinguished engineering career as scholar and professor, as well as a leader in university administration. His seminal work has resulted in major developments in fields ranging from medical technology to wireless communications. With Professor K.C. Smith, Professor Sedra co-authored Microelectronic Circuits, the best-selling engineering textbook in history.

Created in 1986, the Order of Ontario, the province’s highest official honour, recognizes the highest level of individual excellence and achievement in any field. Professor Sedra is one of eight members of the University of Toronto community to be appointed in 2013. Also appointed were journalist Steve Paikin, film director David Cronenberg, lawyer and rights activist Avvy Yao Yao Go and pediatric neurosurgeon James Rutka, among other luminaries.

“Our province is richer for the contributions of these distinguished individuals,” said the Honourable David C. Onley, Lieutenant Governor of Ontario. “Through drive and determination they have pushed boundaries and serve as truly outstanding examples for all Ontarians.”

Professor Sedra received a B.Sc. degree from Cairo University, Egypt, in 1964, and his M.A.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Toronto in 1968 and 1969 respectively; all in electrical engineering. He joined the faculty of the University of Toronto in 1969, rising to the rank of Professor in 1978. He served as chair of ECE from 1986-1993, and assumed the position of Vice-President, Provost, and Chief Academic Officer of the University of Toronto in 1993, a position he held until 2002. He joined University of Waterloo in 2003 as Dean of the Faculty of Engineering and a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Professor Sedra returned to University of Toronto earlier this month to deliver a Distinguished Lecture on his vision for the future of universities.

A team of researchers at the University of Toronto has discovered a method of assembling ‘building blocks’ of gold nanoparticles as the vehicle to deliver cancer medications, or cancer-identifying markers, directly into cancerous tumours.

The study, led by Professor Warren Chan of U of T’s Institute of Biomaterials & Biomedical Engineering (IBBME) and the Donnelly Centre for Cellular & Biomolecular Research, appears in an article in Nature Nanotechnology this week.

“To get materials into a tumour, they need to be a certain size,” explained Professor Chan. “Tumours are characterized by leaky vessels with holes roughly 50 – 500 nanometers in size, depending on the tumour type and stage. The goal is to deliver particles small enough to get through the holes and ‘hang out’ in the tumour’s space for the particles to treat or image the cancer.”

“If a particle is too large,” continued Chan, “it can’t get in, but if the particle is too small, it leaves the tumour very quickly.”

Professor Chan and his researchers solved this problem by creating modular structures ‘glued’ together with DNA.

“We’re using a molecular assembly model – taking pieces of materials that we can now fabricate accurately and organizing them into precise architectures. It’s like putting LEGO blocks together,” said Leo Chou, a PhD student at IBBME and first author of the paper. Chou was awarded a 2012-13 Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation Ontario Region Fellowship for his work with nanotechnology.

“The major advantage of this design strategy is that it is highly modular, which allows you to ‘swap’ components in and out,” said Chou. “This makes it very easy to create systems with multiple functions, or screen a large library of nanostructures for desirable biological behaviours.”

The long-term risk of toxicity from particles that remain in the body, however, has been a serious challenge to nanomedical research.

“Imagine you’re a cancer patient in your 30s, and you’ve had multiple injections of these metal particles,” said Professor Chan. “By the time you’re in your mid-40s, these are likely to be retained in your system and could potentially cause other problems.”

DNA, though, is flexible, and over time, the body’s natural enzymes cause the DNA to degrade, and the assemblage breaks apart. The body then eliminates the smaller particles safely and easily. While the researchers are excited about this breakthrough, Professor Chan cautioned that there is still more work to do.

“We need to understand how DNA design influences the stability of things, and how a lack of stability might be helpful or not,” he said. “The use of assembly to build complex and smart nanotechnology for cancer applications is still in the very primitive stage of development. Still, it is very exciting to be able to see and test the different nano-configurations for cancer applications.”

The project was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation (CBCF) and Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI).

Professor Honghi Tran (ChemE), Director of the Pulp & Paper Centre, has been awarded the John S. Bates Memorial Gold Medal by the Pulp and Paper Technical Association of Canada (PAPTAC).

The Bates Medal is PAPTAC’s most prestigious award, instituted in 1989 to recognize the organization’s founder and first chairman, John S. Bates. The engraved gold medal is awarded annually to a single member in recognition of his or her long-term scientific and technological contributions to the pulp and paper industry.

Professor Tran is an internationally renowned expert in the field of pulp and paper research. He holds the Frank Dottori Chair in Pulp and Paper Engineering and has served as Director of the Pulp and Paper Centre since 2003. Professor Tran is known for applying his research to develop technologies and strategies for mills to increase their energy and chemical recovery efficiencies. As a result, he has attracted significant support from the pulp and paper industry not only in Canada, but worldwide, successfully creating and directing 10 large industrial research consortia to date. He is a Fellow of the Technical Association of the Pulp & Paper Industry and has won several of their most prestigious awards.

“We are delighted that Professor Tran has been recognized for his innovative research and exceptional leadership in the pulp and paper field,” said Cristina Amon, Dean of the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering. “On behalf of the Faculty I offer my warmest congratulations for this well-deserved honour.”

Professor Tran will receive the award on February 6, during PaperWeek Canada’s Awards Business Luncheon in Montreal.