With the Pan Am/ Parapan Am Games beginning in Toronto today, the U of T Engineering community is cheering on two of its own.
Donna Vakalis (CivE PhD Candidate) competes for Team Canada in the modern pentathlon and Sasha Gollish (CivE MEng 1T0, EngEd PhD Candidate) runs for Canada in the 1500m.
When they’re not training, Vakalis studies the impact of indoor building environments on public health and productivity under the supervision of professors Heather MacLean and Jeffrey Siegel (both CivE) and Gollish is one of the first students enrolled in the Faculty’s new Engineering Education (EngEd) program, supervised by Professor Bryan Karney (CivE).
U of T Engineering spoke to both athletes in the days leading up to the games to find out how they balance engineering and sport.
What has it been like since you found out you made Team Canada?
Gollish: It’s been a total rush for sure! But it only happened recently so I’m not even sure it has totally sunk in. My goal was to qualify for the Pan Ams, but my other goal was to run fast. So I’ve been travelling a lot and continuing to compete.
Vakalis: I’ve been focused on world championships, which just happened last weekend, in Germany. It may sound like a lot all at once, but it’s actually useful because it’s a little tricky to peak twice in a year. You don’t want them too far apart, or right on top of each other, but two weeks is actually perfect.
Let’s talk about what it took to get here. When did you decide that you were going to go for it?
Gollish: Last summer I was competing in Leuven, Belgium, in a series that is basically like the Belgian Cup. I ran a 4:13 and I thought, hey, if I can run that now, I wonder what I can run next summer.
Vakalis: The fall after I competed [at the Olympics] in London, I started school. At that point I thought it might be time to retire, because it just requires a lot of energy in addition to being a full-time student. However, I surprised myself and learned how to be even more efficient with my time. At the beginning of this school year I found myself being really fit and eager to compete. I had to make a choice, am I going to go for it or not? I made that choice, and my supervisors fortunately were supportive. The goal of this whole season has been to qualify for Pan Ams.
When did you realize you actually had a shot?
Gollish: It wasn’t until I ran at Harry Jerome, part of the national series which was June 9 in Vancouver. The rankings were really tight and I was sitting in third position. There just weren’t that many fast races in North America, and I was trying to really push my boundaries. Plus there are a lot of awesome middle-distance runners right now in Canada: Kate Van Buskirk, Hilary Stellingwerff, Sheila Reid, Nicole Siffuentes. It could have been any two of us that were named to that team.
Vakalis: I was at a world cup in Rome in April. Because of how our qualification system works, they take our top two scores from last year’s world championships and the four world cups. At the moment I crossed the finish line in Rome, I knew I had done what it takes to qualify.
Why did you choose to do graduate studies at U of T?
Gollish: U of T is a pretty awesome engineering school to get into. It’s also got a phenomenal running program, and my coaches are the varsity coaches, so it’s a natural fit.
Another reason was my supervisor, Bryan Karney. We met a few years ago, and we share a passion for the science, the math. I call it the ‘Enginerd’ passion. My other background is coaching, so the Engineering Education (called EngEd) program is a really unique way to blend the skills of coaching and engineering.
Vakalis: There were multiple reasons. I knew I wanted to live in Toronto, and from doing my masters here, I knew U of T has a really strong school with a rigorous academic program. But I also care a lot about the people and atmosphere in the department. For me the single most important factor was meeting the professors and their students. Now, finishing up my third year I feel like I am part of a really smart, ambitious, supportive family.
Have you learned anything as an engineer that has affected your athletics, or vice versa?
Gollish: I take a very scientific approach to things, which I think is probably rooted in studying engineering. With running, there are a lot of fads that come and go, but I always look to see what the science says.
There’s also the whole efficiency game. I’m always trying to be efficient with my time, and maximize it, to use a calculus term. It’s not necessarily about doing more with less effort, but asking how can I get the most out of each day
Vakalis: There are so many connections if you are willing to think analogically. For example, as an athlete you can start to see connections between the structural properties of materials and the way your body works. I was recovering from an injury earlier this year, and it was helpful to understand the mechanics of my body, in order to heal smarter and faster.
In the other direction, being a pentathlete who has to execute moves perfectly when an Olympic berth will be on the line, it helps to be able to think clearly under tremendous pressure. That’s helpful for standing up and teaching a class, or being able to answer a challenging question in front of your thesis defence committee.
What is it like to be competing on home turf in Toronto?
Gollish: Obviously it’s pretty cool. Most athletes don’t get that opportunity, but it also comes with a host of pressures. You’ve got all your friends and family who are super-stoked to come out and watch you, and there’s the feeling that you have to perform.
But you don’t. At the end of the day, they know how hard you worked, they know how dedicated you are. If it doesn’t go that well they still love you.
Vakalis: In modern pentathlon, we’ve never had a world cup in Canada, so this is a first in terms of the caliber of competition at home. Honestly, I don’t think I will even know how much it means until the day I compete. There are members of my family and really close friends who have never been able to watch me compete, who will be there in the stands next weekend.
When I think of them it’s a very acute and intense feeling, but I also feel a little bit of that same feeling about the whole community. Having U of T students and Torontonians around, and being able to share with them something that is a big part of my life, and is really important to me. It feels really special, because it is.
These interviews have been edited and condensed.
U of T Engineering startup Onyx Motion is partnering with NBA shooting guard Ben Gordon in a bid to raise the calibre of digital basketball coaching offered by the company’s first-of-its-kind technology, a smartwatch app that offers on-court skills guidance.
“We’re hoping to build a motion marketplace — a library of data, moves and audio tips from pro players,” said Onyx Motion co-founder and CEO Marissa Wu (EngSci 1T3).
The U of T Engineering-developed startup announced Gordon’s role in helping to further development of the app, called Swish, on July 8.
Swish uses smartwatch motion sensors to analyze athlete techniques and offer straightforward tips on how a player can improve.
“The Swish technology is bringing users closer to their favourite basketball player by giving them the opportunity to learn from them,” said Gordon. “I’m excited to work with the team on the further development of this one-of-a-kind experience and help players at any level improve their game.”
The company founded by Wu has developed quickly. From the seeds of an idea as part of the Next 36 entrepreneurship development program it progressed to a startup, receiving support through the University of Toronto Early Stage Technology accelerator (offered jointly by MaRS Innovation) and winning a spot on CBC’s Next Gen Den.
Now, with its partnership with an award-winning NBA player and an IndieGoGo campaign, the company’s concept of a basketball coaching app has grown into much more, said Wu.
Next Generation of AI for Sport Coaching
“Here at Onyx Motion, we are building the next generation of AI for sports coaching,” said Wu. “Swish allows mobile devices to break into physical interaction to a point where it can tell you what to do to get better. Our goal was to create a health and fitness device that would give personal recommendations, not just churn out numbers.”
She said the Swish app is only the first part of Onyx Motion’s plan to move into other sports and industries where kinaesthetic learning is key. Basketball is only the first shot.
“I grew up playing basketball,” Wu recently told U of T Engineering News. “My dad got me into it, it was how we bonded, so I’m sure that was important.”
The introduction between Gordon and Onyx Motion was made by alumnus Karl Martin (EngSci 0T1, ElecE MASc 0T3, PhD 1T0), CEO of Nymi (formerly Bionym), another U of T Engineering startup whose debut product is a wearable biometric wristband that unlocks passwords, key codes and more by authenticating the wearer’s unique heartbeat rhythm. The technology recently attracted millions in investment and the attention of major media, including the Wall Street Journal and Wired magazine.
Martin said Bill Burgos, the Orlando Magic’s head strength and conditioning coach, had been in touch with Nymi to explore potential applications for athlete training. The fellow engineering science alumnus and UTEST mentor then introduced Burgos to Wu and Onyx Motion, which led to their connection to Gordon.
“The Onyx Motion team is onto something huge with their approach to digital sports coaching,” said Martin. “The Swish app represents the next generation of wearable tech applications, analyzing motion data and providing truly useful and actionable insights, rather than just letting you know what your activity levels are. It speaks volumes that they got Ben Gordon on board as their director of innovation and I’m really looking forward to seeing this take off.”
Nymi launches a pilot program with Mastercard, RBC and TD Bank this month, in which a special version of their Nymi band will be used for “tap and pay” payments at retailers supporting the Mastercard PayPass system.The startup grew from Martin’s U of T research and developed through a variety of the university’s entrepreneurship supports, including the Creative Destruction Lab accelerator. Martin continues to offer mentorship to founders such as Wu, who are new to taking their academic work into the market.
Wu recently told U of T Engineering News that she drew on her undergraduate-developed knowledge of biomechanical modelling of the human body in translating accelerometer data into actual movements.
She also said her leadership role in the University of Toronto Engineering Competition helped prime her to become her own CEO.
“I discovered that I loved running a team and creating my own path,” she said. “I liked the fact that there’s no right answer.”
Wu says that while Onyx Motion has big plans for future applications, her team is ready to take it one step at a time.
“We built it pretty much from scratch, so there isn’t a lot to compare it with,” she said. “We’re excited to learn from the experience of people using it, and to move forward with making it that much better.”
And to other aspiring entrepreneurs, she offers some already hard-won advice:
“Know why you’re doing it because you will have to persevere through lots of up and downs.”
Read more about Onyx Motion and other U of T Engineering startups to watch.
Professor Mark Fox (MIE) has been named a University of Toronto Distinguished Professor of Urban Systems Engineering, an honour that recognizes his exceptional career achievements and promise.
Awarded by the U of T Office of the Vice-President and Provost, Fox holds the title for a five-year term, beginning July 1, 2015. He is one of only 25 U of T faculty members and six Engineering professors that actively hold this distinction.
Fox is a pioneer in the theory and application of artificial intelligence in industrial systems. He is the director of the Enterprise Integration Laboratory (EIL) at U of T Engineering, a centre that investigates how organizations can build smarter cities locally and globally through the use of information and communications technologies. He is also director of the new Centre for Social Services Engineering, which applies engineering theories and techniques to the efficient and effective delivery of social services.
Fox focuses on developing ways of representing knowledge about cities, whether it be the services they provide or the infrastructure they maintain, in mathematical models. Known as ontologies, these models enable the development of smart cities.
In 1981, Fox’s research led to the creation of the field of “Constraint Directed Scheduling” within artificial intelligence, which is used in all modern scheduling systems today. He also spearheaded the application of artificial intelligence to project management, simulation and material design.
In 1984, he co-founded the software company Carnegie Group Inc., which specialized in intelligent systems for solving engineering, manufacturing and telecommunications problems. The firm provided logistics planning technology to the US Department of Defense. In 1992, he co-founded Novator Systems, a pioneer in the design and delivery of eCommerce software and services.
“I congratulate Professor Mark Fox on this well-deserved honour,” said Professor Ted Sargent, vice-dean of research at U of T Engineering. “It recognizes his remarkable achievements and leadership in his field over many years, and is yet another example of our Faculty’s commitment to excellence.”
Fox is a senior fellow in the University’s Global Cities Institute and a past holder of the NSERC Industrial Research Chair in Enterprise Integration. He is also a fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence and was a co-founder of the AAAI Special Interest Group in Manufacturing. Furthermore, he was elected a joint fellow of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR) and PRECARN. He received the Engineering Institute of Canada’s Canadian Pacific Railway Medal in 2011.
Fox earned a BSc in computer science from the University of Toronto in 1975, and his PhD in computer science from Carnegie Mellon University in 1983. Prior to his return to Toronto, he was an associate professor of computer science and robotics at Carnegie Mellon. He was a founding member of the Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute, founding director of the Robotics Institute Intelligent Systems Laboratory and founding director of the Center for Integrated Manufacturing Decision Systems of The Robotics Institute.
At a “U of T in Your Neighbourhood” lecture earlier this year, Fox spoke about how smart cities need citizens to take more control. Read more.
On June 24, U of T Engineering alumni, faculty, students and staff gathered to celebrate the groundbreaking of the Centre for Engineering Innovation & Entrepreneurship (CEIE).
Expected to open in 2017, the building will be the beginning of a new era for engineering research and education in the Faculty. It will strengthen opportunities for students, professors, alumni and industry partners to work together and accelerate transformative solutions to some of the world’s greatest challenges.
The groundbreaking festivities kicked off with senior University and student leaders revealing the many innovative aspects of the building that are designed to inspire collaboration, nurture entrepreneurship and cultivate the next generation of global engineering leaders.
“The Centre for Engineering Innovation & Entrepreneurship is a much-needed response to the sweeping changes in the engineering profession,” said Dean Cristina Amon. “It will be a vibrant hub that harnesses the boundless energy and creativity of our engineering community by fostering experiential learning and heightening opportunities for cross-disciplinary collaboration.”
During the event, the Faculty unveiled a fly-through video illustrating the building’s many dynamic and flexible environments that will allow students to translate imagination into reality. These include Technology Enhanced Active Learning rooms, versatile student club areas, space for The Entrepreneurship Hatchery and facilities for prototyping, fabrication and visualization.
“By incorporating innovation in engineering education and smart building design, the CEIE will be one of the finest research and teaching environments of any engineering school in the world,” said Meric Gertler, president of the University of Toronto.
The celebrations also included more than 12 interactive exhibits showcasing the many multidisciplinary research labs and institutes that will call the CEIE home. Focusing on areas such as water, sustainable energy, robotics and mechatronics, engineering leadership, multidisciplinary design and global engineering, these hubs will bring together some of the most talented minds from across the Faculty, the University and beyond.
“Today, we take a collective and monumental step forward with the CEIE as we turn an idea into reality,” said George Myhal (IndE 7T8), an early pace-setting donor and chair of the Engineering Campaign Executive Committee. “The ambitious vision of the Faculty has come to fruition, a testament to the engagement, pride and affinity of our campaign donors, faculty, staff, students and friends. The CEIE will transform our Faculty and will be an important legacy for future generations of engineers.”
Learn more about the CEIE:
Biomedical engineers at the University of Toronto have invented a new device that more quickly and accurately visualizes the chemical messages that tell our cells how to multiply. The tool improves our understanding of how cancerous growth begins, and could identify new targets for cancer medications.
Throughout the human body, certain signalling chemicals — known as hormones — tell various cells when to grow, divide and proliferate. However, not all cells respond to these signals in the same manner. In rare instances, the internal chemical response of a cell can cause unregulated cell growth, leading to cancer.
To look into the responses of different cells, the U of T team harnessed the emerging power of digital microfluidics, which involves shuttling tiny drops of water around on a series of small electrodes that looks like a miniature checkerboard. Published today in Nature Communications, the paper explains how they were able to increase the speed at which chemical changes can be detected by a factor of 100.
“By applying the right sequence of voltages, we can create electric fields that attract and move around droplets containing any chemical solution,” says first author Alphonsus Ng (BioMedE PhD 1T4) who recently graduated with a PhD from the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering (IBBME) and Donnelly Centre, and is now a post-doctoral fellow in the lab of Professor Aaron Wheeler (IBBME, Chemistry).
Ng and his team’s method allows the scientists to deliver a quick-fire sequence of chemicals to small groups of cells stuck to the surface of the board.
For example, the first drop might contain a hormone that tells cells to grow faster. Within seconds, this hormone sets off a chain reaction called a “phosphorylation cascade,” modifying certain proteins within the cell in a specific sequence. To see these changes, scientists deliver a second drop containing formaldehyde, which freezes the all the proteins in place. They then deliver a third drop containing fluorescent antibodies that stick only to the proteins modified in the cascade. Looking at the antibodies in a microscope provides a snapshot of what has changed and what hasn’t.
By building up a series of snapshots at different time intervals, scientists can see how the cascade progresses. “It’s like a flipboard; each snapshot gives us a static image, but when you combine them all together, you can see movement or action,” says Dean Chamberlain, a post-doctoral researcher at IBBME, the Donnelly Centre and the Department of Chemistry.
Using sequences of chemicals to measure how cells respond to a hormone is nothing new. But until now, scientists were limited by how fast they could add each chemical in the sequence. Using an eye-dropper or a pipette to drop solutions into petri dishes is inherently cumbersome. “Even with robots, you just can’t pipette that fast,” says Chamberlain. “In general, a two-minute time scale is considered pretty good.” By contrast, the new microfluidic system can deliver drops only seconds apart
The team also made some interesting discoveries when they tested the technique on a type of breast cancer cells. “Roughly 10 per cent of the cells had a very rapid and strong response that we could detect up to five minutes before the rest of the population,” says Chamberlain. The team speculates that these “rapid responders” may be involved in the early stages of tumour generation, although more research is needed to confirm this.
While scientists have long suspected that some cancer cells respond to signals faster and more strongly than others, the new device offers a way to study such cells in unprecedented detail. “With the ability to probe these reactions with the same speed at which they occur, we’re better equipped to figure out the internal wiring of the cell,” says Ng. The team hopes to discover new cell types or proteins that could be targeted by drugs, eventually leading to new medicines to fight cancer.
A handheld device and “talking stickers” are a University of Toronto startup’s strategy to improve the vocabulary and communication skills of children in impoverished communities.
“We wanted to create something that was play-based,” said Aisha Bukhari (ElecE 0T8), a graduate of both U of T Engineering and the Rotman School of Management MBA program, who is also the co-founder of Attollo Social Enterprise, the team behind the innovative solution. “We wanted it to be affordable, scalable and loved by children.”
Worldwide, more than 100 million impoverished children under the age of six lack the opportunity to develop their cognitive skills fully, mainly due to a lack of adults talking, singing and reading to them. Attollo’s innovation is designed to address this deficit.
Attollo stickers feature illustrations of familiar objects and come with pre-programmed quick response (QR) codes that are activated by a simple, low-cost reader with playback and recording functions. Parents and caregivers can customize the stickers to talk, sing and read in any language. They are designed to be placed on any household item, transforming it into an educational toy.
Bukhari and the Attollo team, which is composed of Rotman MBA and Engineering alumnus Peter Cinat (CompE 0T2), as well as recent Rotman MBA graduates Jamie Austin and Lak Chinta, have been attracting international attention since last December, when they finished first in the U of T Hult Prize competition.
They then won the Hult regional rounds in Dubai in March, and are now preparing for the global final at the Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting in New York in September. There, they will compete against five other teams from universities in Europe, Asia and America.
The Hult Prize, which bills itself as the world’s largest student competition, awards $1 million USD in seed capital each year to the winning team. Designed to foster social entrepreneurship, the prize was named as one of the top five ideas changing the world by Bill Clinton and Time magazine.
This summer, the Attollo founders will travel to Hyderabad, India, and Mombasa, Kenya, to pilot their project. They will also spend time at an incubator at the Hult International Business School in Boston, where they will receive mentoring and strategic planning advice.
The team is working on two prototypes. Bukhari said one model is a minimum viable product (MVP) — a basic version of the device — that the team will use to pilot the concept in Hyderabad and Mombasa.
“We’re working with Autodesk Research Toronto on the MVP, with a focus on product design and form factor,” she said.
Attollo is also collaborating with electrical engineering professor David Johns (ECE). His company, Icewire Makerspace, is helping the group with electronics to develop a low-cost solution that is scalable.
“We were impressed by Attollo’s energy and desire to make an impact on early education worldwide,” Johns said. “Although they had an excellent business plan and worthwhile goals, they needed technical help. We want to give the Attollo team support so that they can make the best pitch they possibly can in September.”
The team has been receiving additional mentorship from Monica McGlynn-Stewart, a professor at the School of Early Childhood at George Brown College. McGlynn-Stewart has provided feedback on content and oversaw a local pilot in Toronto where children were exposed to talking stickers for the first time.
Product development was also undertaken by Matt Ratto at the Semaphore Lab at U of T — a research cluster on mobile and pervasive computing that focuses on accessibility and emerging digital technologies.
Bukhari said piloting the concept and fundraising are Attollo’s main priorities leading up to the Hult Prize final.
“We will iterate the solution and business model based on the field results,” she said.
Homepage banner photos courtesy of United Nations and Roberta Baker.