Lab2Market Partners With NSERC to Deliver Their First National Cohort
Toronto, March 10, 2022 – Toronto Metropolitan University’s Centre for Engineering Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CEIE) of the Faculty of Engineering and Architectural Sciences (FEAS) is excited to announce the partnership with the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada. The partnership will allow Lab2Market (L2M) to be delivered nationally as a pilot and build upon the success of the regional programs.
Offered by the Innovation Boost Zone (IBZ), each cohort offers selected researchers access to world-class mentors, a community of like-minded entrepreneurs, and $20,000 in funding.
“The I2I Grants do a tremendous job of providing researchers and ILOs with the funding to develop their technologies, but this new and different opportunity is offering an earlier stage program to further improve the funnel of research commercialization activities across the country” says France Vaillancourt of the NSERC I2I Team.
The pilot program was developed due to the growing demand of the deeptech ecosystem, and the increasing need for Canadian research to go from the lab to market.
Dr. Jeremy Hirota, Canada Research Chair in Respiratory Mucosal Immunology, went through the regional Lab2Market Program in the summer of 2021 – and had the following to say about the program: “The L2M process was very compelling for scientists that were already using the scientific method in lab environments. In the program, we were requested to define hypotheses, but instead of these being tested in the lab, they were being tested in the marketplace. The shaping of the L2M program this way makes the skills learned highly transferable and not tied to our proposed project. Indeed, we have already started applying the lessons learned through this approach to two other research projects in our group to better understand translational potential. I am excited to bring this new perspective to our interdisciplinary group – it’s the future – and I wish I had learned it earlier.”
“All across Canada we need our inventors to actively participate in leading efforts to tackle our biggest problems. With this partnership we can help fund our graduate students to do just that and take their inventions to market,” said Dr. Tarek Sadek, the executive director of CEIE. “ We needed a program that brings our brightest minds together around emerging technologies to come up with new innovative solutions to our grand challenges.”
The first pilot program received 108 applications from 32 universities. Out of these, 48 teams representing 25 universities were chosen to go through the first cohort. The inaugural cohort will start on March 14, to initiate their entrepreneurial journeys. The cohort will be industry agnostic, spread across a diverse range of projects, including synthetic biology, advanced materials, additive manufacturing, and more. Meet the full cohort below.
Meet the Teams
| Name | University | Technology |
| Abdullah Rahnama | University of Toronto | New-generation all-fibre grating sensing and spectroscopy |
| Ahmad Abdellatif | Concordia University | AskGit: Chat with your software project |
| Alireza Dabbaghian | York University | Fully-customizable wireless EEG monitoring platform with motion artifact resilience and input-adaptive active-electrode recording |
| Antonio Cavalcante Pereira | Concordia University | Development of an in situ filtration process to improve surface water quality |
| Athanasios Kritharis | University of British Columbia | Sustainable manufacturing of next-generation, performance biofabrics for the fashion industry |
| Austin McLean | University of Toronto | A passive drip irrigation controller for efficient water use |
| Boris Nazareth | University of Waterloo | Copolymer solution for metal oxide binding applications |
| Calvin Lieu | University of Toronto | Investigating the potential appetite-supressing effects of a novel cytokinin. |
| Chowdhury Sakib-Uz-Zaman | University of Regina | Pellet extruder based industrial 3d printer |
| Diana Diaz Dussan | University of Alberta | Precision Glycosciences- Glycopolymers for gene and drug delivery |
| Eduard Wisernig | University of Victoria | Navigation platform with enhanced telemetry and visualization, using augmented reality on a hybrid 2d/holographic 3d display system |
| Elham Kheradmand Nezhad | Universite de Montreal | Leverage artificial intelligence to improve Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) data and assess the quality of ESG reports |
| Frieder Kaiser | Queen’s University | Portable large-scale flow measurement system |
| Ghadeer Abu-Alsoud | Memorial University of Newfoundland | Analytical technology for early detection of microbially-influenced corrosion biomarkers |
| Guillermo Trabes | Carleton University | Crowd space simulator |
| Haleh Nazemi | University of Windsor | Integrated micromachined sensors for pest detection |
| Hamed Haddadpajouh | University of Guelph | A robust malware threat hunting system and method based on deep neural networks in iot environments |
| Hamed Nasiri | Memorial University of Newfoundland | Ultra-low power SAR ADC for low-activity signals |
| Jari Swanson | University of Alberta | UAV-based vector magnetic survey system for geophysical exploration |
| Jeonghyun Lee | University of British Columbia | Image-based cell sorting |
| Juanjuan Liu | McGill University | Market analysis for monitoring gout disease at the point of need using a CMOS-based device |
| Kathrivel Nallapan | Polytechnique Montréal | Mobile & Cozy – an all-textile heating-assisted therapy platform for sufferers of chronic pain |
| Kelycia Leimert | University of Alberta | A bioassay to predict birth timing |
| Kyle Cheung | Toronto Metropolitan University | Positive pombe: engineering anti-depressant molecules in fission yeast |
| Lounes Ouarab | École de technologie supérieure | GEOMETRIX, Limitless shaping |
| Mahdi Alaei Varnosfaderani | University of Manitoba | Design of a portable bio-inspired vibro-based burrowing probe for space mining and subsurface investigation of extreme environments. |
| Mariia Zhuldybina | École de technologie supérieure | Terahertz technology for quality inspection of printed electronics |
| Maxime Leblanc Latour | University of Ottawa | Plant based resin for industrial coating applications. |
| Michael Pumphrey | Memorial University of Newfoundland | Development of electromagnetic reluctance motion actuator for scanning and advanced manufacturing applications for industry 4.0 |
| Milena Restan Perez | University of Victoria | Development of HeartPrint Bioink |
| Mohammad Elmi | University of Alberta | Self-powered wireless electrocardiogram device |
| Muersha Wusiman | University of British Columbia | Sensor for real-time detection of chemical contaminants in water |
| Olina Dagher | University of Calgary | Air flow- assisted electrocautery device and system |
| Rodrigo Queiroz | University of Waterloo | Scalable and interoperable simulation for testing automated vehicles |
| Roshan Aggarwal | University of Guelph | Convenient and low-cost methods and devices for performing reproducible multiplexed bioassays |
| Salam Bari | Western University | A reliable and fault-tolerant wireless data communication system for harsh environments |
| Sandrine Parent | University of Ottawa | Biological therapies to prevent life threatening heart rhythms after heart surgery |
| Sarah Currie | University of Manitoba | Rechargeable potent antiviral facemasks with a novel quaternized N-chloramine. |
| Sittichai Sukreep | Ontario Tech University | Real-time traffic analytics from live camera feeds |
| Soheil Akbari | Université Laval | Development of an integrated software for complex flows of cement plug placement in oil wells abandonment (CemPA) |
| Sophie Watts | Dalhousie University | Gene edited disease resistant grapes |
| Thomas Brenner | University of British Columbia | Microencapsulated bacteriophage cocktail for the targeted inhibition of Salmonella enterica in broiler chickens |
| Vahid Abolhasannejad | Toronto Metropolitan University | Monitoring of pavement distresses using automated vision-based method |
| Valentina Lukinovic | Carleton University | A novel strategy towards the computational development of peptide ‘disruptors’ to be used as molecular probes or therapeutic molecules. |
| Valentyna Maslieieva | University of Calgary | Cytinnov Biotechnologies: a cell-manufacturing process optimization service |
| Weisong Shi | Toronto Metropolitan University | Three-dimensional real-time optical coherence tomography for retinal disease diagnosis and treatment |
| Yverick Rangom | University of Waterloo | Enabling extreme fast-charging of lithium-ion batteries with covalently-joined electrode architectures |
| Zixiong Han | University of Ottawa | An IoT-based contactless vital signs monitoring system |
