The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) announced 78 Strategic Project Grants, including 10 for 㽶Ƶ researchers totaling nearly $4.7 million. 2 of these researchers are from the Faculty of Dentistry and have received funding to help support research or training with the potential to strongly enhance the economy or the environment. Congratulations to Dr. Jake Barralet and Dr. Maryam Tabrizian. Jake Barralet, Faculty of Dentistry, Faculty of Medicine, was awarded $167 000 per year for a three year period for his project “Nanoparticles to Superparticles: New Materials for Clean Energy”. This project is focused on improving efficiency of fuel cells which run on hydrogen to produce water. Together with Ballard, one of the top fuel cell manufacturers in the world, based in Burnaby BC, this project will endeavour to improve processing to help reduce costs of fuel cells so one day in the not too distant future we will be filling up with hydrogen. The industry partner is Ballard. Maryam Tabrizian, Department of Biomedical Engineering, was awarded $142 000 per year for three years for her project “Integrated On-Chip Microfluidic System with Surface Plasmon Resonance Biosensor for Time-Effective Detection of Legionella pneumophila in Contaminated Water”. Legionella are gram-negative bacteria found in natural aquatic habitats, especially in potable water, cooling tower and heat exchanger systems. The industrial partner is Magnus Chemicals Inc. .
Photo Credit: John Kelsey