Myrtede Alfred is joining the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering as an Assistant Professor in Industrial Engineering. Prior to joining University of Toronto, she served as a research assistant professor at the Medical University of South Carolina where she spent the past three years applying her expertise as a human factors engineer to improve the delivery of care through both research and practice.

Can you tell us about your research?

Disparities in health outcomes are a challenge many health systems in the world are facing. Social factors including income, education, and environment as well as clinical care contribute to health inequity. My research identifies and examines clinical systems factors contributing to racial/ ethnic health disparities. I apply human factors engineering approaches and leverage health disparities frameworks developed in the social sciences to model clinical systems and patients’ journeys through those systems in order to identify safety threats and adverse events disparately impacting racialized people. This research represents a novel paradigm for both disparities and patient safety work that will yield insight on the underlying mechanisms that contribute to unjust variations in care and support the design of targeted interventions to improve equity at the health system level.

What attracted you to MIE at U of T?

A few things, but at the top of the list was the opportunity to work in a top tier human factors program with great colleagues and students. MIE offered a collaborative work environment where I could do impactful research and work with students from across the world. I appreciated the equity, diversity and inclusion efforts within the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering and the department’s strong connection to the surrounding health systems was also a huge plus. Plus, Toronto is a cool, diverse city with great food.

What do you hope to achieve within MIE over the next few years?

We are fortunately seeing much greater interest in improving health equity so I am very excited to support these efforts. Through my current research on maternal health disparities, I hope to develop approaches to examine clinical system equity that can be applied to a broad range of health-care disparities. This includes investigating clinical processes to uncover institutionalized biases and disproportionate burden of risk, identifying accessible sources of data that can be analyzed qualitatively or quantitatively to provide insight on differences in the quality of care and developing mechanisms for community engagement in the redesign of clinical care processes.

But, just in case health-care disparities are not solved in the next few years, it’s also important to me to recruit and train underrepresented students in human factors. The lived experiences of these students add value to our understanding of disparities and diversifying the engineering workforce supports innovation and helps prevent or reduce harmful biases in design.

How do you like to spend your free time?

I have a few rotating hobbies, depending on the season. I enjoy playing basketball and tennis (poorly but confidently), birding, gardening, drone flying, and watching David Attenborough documentaries. Oh, and I also play spades (Joker Joker Deuce Deuce) and videogames.

Do you have any advice for students starting with us this fall?

Find time to safely connect with other students or other people in general – clubs, sports, Discord, Netflix tele-parties. The pandemic has changed the college experience (at least in the short-term) and the isolation can take a toll even on the introverts among us.

-Published September 2, 2021 by Lynsey Mellon, lynsey@mie.utoronto.ca

The disruptions caused by COVID-19 have left hospitals across North America with massive backlogs of postponed elective surgeries. Many of these patients will also need rehabilitation following their surgeries, and managing this patient flow through the hospitals is a complex challenge. Professor Vahid Sarhangian (MIE) and his team are developing new solutions.

“Hospitals currently rely on experience and ad-hoc approaches to make decisions around rehab admissions,” says Sarhangian, who was appointed the Director of the Centre for Healthcare Engineering earlier this year.

“But because of the high demand and variability in how long rehabilitation will take, there is often a lack of available beds, leading to wait times that are costly both for the hospital and the patients.”

Long wait times lead to bed blocking in acute care wards and create congestion upstream— for example, in the emergency department. But they also delay the rehab care for patients, which could in turn negatively impact their outcomes and increase the length of their stay in rehab, leading to even more congestion.

“Our team uses statistical and mathematical models built on patient-level data to provide evidence-based support to the problem of patient prioritization,” says Sarhangian.

“Our goal is to optimize the sequence by which patients are admitted into rehab in order to both reduce wait times and improve rehab outcomes.”

The team’s models take account of the type of acute care that has resulted in the need for rehabilitation — for example, treatment for a bacterial disease vs. recovery from orthopedic surgery — as well as specific details about the patients themselves, such as age and severity of illness. With a better understanding of how wait times impact outcomes and the amount of time spent in rehab, hospitals can prioritize those patients for whom early admission would make the biggest difference.

Funding for this project comes from the Connaught New Researcher Awards. Sarhangian is one of more than 50 researchers from across U of T supported in the latest round, including three others from U of T Engineering:

• Leo Chou (BME) — Programmable plug-and-play vaccine formulation using DNA nanotechnology
• John Simpson-Porco (ECE) — Robust high-performance algorithms for feedback optimization
• Marianne Touchie (CivMin) — Evidence-based compartmentalization requirements for apartment buildings to improve building energy performance and occupant health and comfort

– This story was originally published on the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering News Site on August 27, 2021 by Tyler Irving

A new material designed by U of T Engineering researchers combines the flexibility of human skin with improved conductivity and tolerance of temperatures as low as -93 ^oC.

Known as ionic skin, or iSkin, the substance could enhance a wide range of technologies, from wearable electronics to soft robotics.

The substance is described in detail in a paper recently published in Advanced Functional Materials. It belongs to a family of materials called hydrogels.

“Hydrogels are cross-linked polymers that are able to hold a lot of water within their chemical structures,” says Binbin Ying. He led the design of the material while pursuing graduate studies at McGill University and simultaneously working as a visiting PhD student in the lab of Professor Xinyu Liu (MIE, BME). Ying is now completing a postdoctoral fellowship at MIT.

“Many of the tissues in our own bodies are hydrogels, so they are often used in applications where biocompatibility is important, such as cosmetics or tissue engineering. But if we want to use them in soft, flexible or wearable electronics, we need to add in new functionalities, such as mechanical stretchability and electrical conductivity.”

Last year, Ying and Liu unveiled an earlier iteration of iSkin which showed off some of its capabilities: it is self-powered, nontoxic, and can stretch to 400% of its original size.

Most importantly, bending the material creates a proportional change in its conductivity. This enables it to convert physical movement into an analogous electrical signal.

“A physiotherapist could stick in on your knee or your elbow to measure when and by how much your joint is moving,” says Liu. “We’ve also coated it on a glove, enabling us to measure and track hand movements, which in turn can be used to control a robot. It’s a very versatile way to facilitate all kinds of human-machine interactions.”

Further work — including contributions from undergraduate students Ryan Chen (Year 3 EngSci), Runze Zuo (Year 3 CompE) and Zhanfeng Zhou (MIE PhD candidate) — has explored other applications for iSkin. For example, adding patches of the material to a mechanical gripper provides a set of feedback signals that is unique to each item being gripped.

This robot uses iSkin to convert the action of the soft gripper into a set of electrical signals. Using AI algorithms, the system can analyze patterns in the signals to “feel” and sort the items it is picking up. (Video: Runze Zuo and Binbin Ying, originally presented at ICRA2021)

Analyzing the combinations of signals can enable the robot to “feel” what it’s picking up. In combination with artificial intelligence algorithms, the robot can even learn to discriminate between items that are hard versus soft, round versus cubic, etc. and sort them appropriately.

But until now, iSkin had a drawback that is common to all hydrogels: when the water within it freezes, the resulting ice crystals can do serious damage to the complex polymer matrix. Cool, dry air can also suck the remaining liquid water out of the hydrogel.

Ying and his team members addressed this problem by adding glycerol, a non-toxic chemical commonly used in everything from foods to hair gel, into the hydrogel. After carefully testing hundreds of possible recipes, they developed a new iSkin formulation that increases cold tolerance without sacrificing the material’s other useful properties.

As an added bonus, the new formulation enables the hydrogel to adhere even more easily to both skin, clothing and other materials.

“We stuck it to the outside of a jacket and walked out into a Toronto winter, where it was 10 degrees below zero,” says Ying. “We were able to take the same kinds of measurements as we did in the lab.”

Cold tolerance and improved stickiness further increase the list of possible applications for the material. For example, the sorting mechanical gripper could now operate in a low-temperature storage facility where it would be uncomfortable for a human to work.

The team also envisions other possibilities, such as soft robots designed to clamber over rough terrain in arctic environments. In the future, they plan to continue to develop the material, including potentially miniaturizing it.

– This story was originally published on the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering News Site on August 3, 2021 by Tyler Irving

Professor Xinyu Liu (MIE) and his team design robots, but their latest creation stretches the very definition of the term: though it’s controlled by a computer, the robot body has no mechanical parts.

Instead, the physical body of the robot is a tiny, soil-dwelling worm known as C. elegans.

“Essentially, what we’ve done is to replace the organism’s neural control patterns with our own control, using light-based stimulation,” says Liu. “This enables us to achieve complete closed-loop control of a living organism, which is a new strategy in robotics.”

C. elegans worms are often used in biology studies as a model organism, due to their brief lifespans, anatomical simplicity and genetic similarity to more complex organisms. Ten years ago, Liu was inspired by a video created by German-American research team that had modified a C. elegans worm using a technique known as optogenetics.

In this method, nerve and muscle cells within organisms are genetically modified to express a type of light-sensitive protein called rhodopsin. Because C. elegans is transparent, shining light on the affected muscle cells causes them to contract and bend the worm’s body.

“In the video, they shone a laser light on the side of the worm, and that part would bend due to the muscle stimulation,” says Liu. “Our hypothesis was that if you could coordinate the pattern of that light simulation, you could replicate the worm’s natural method of locomotion.”

C. elegans worms move like snakes, twisting their bodies left and right in an S-shaped pattern, similar to a sine wave. Though this pattern is relatively simple from a mathematical point of view, replicating it in a controlled way turned out to be very difficult.

A key breakthrough was achieved when Liu’s team, working in collaboration with a group led by U of T Professor Mei Zhen (Molecular Genetics & Physiology), created a genetically modified worm that was in some ways the reverse of one in the original video Liu saw. Rather than bending its muscles when exposed to light, this one gave off light whenever its muscles were activated.

“Watching the pattern of muscle activation, we could see that it was slightly out of phase with the movement of the animal,” says Liu. “In other words, the muscles fire slightly before the actual motion. If we wanted more accurate control of where the worm was going, we needed to account for this phase difference in our light stimulation pattern.”

In a paper recently published in Science Robotics, Liu and his team describe how they created RoboWorm. An optogenetically modified C. elegans worm is subjected to a pattern of light simulation — controlled by sophisticated algorithms developed by Liu and his team — which activates the worm’s muscles in the right sequence to replicate the snake-like locomotion pattern.

The algorithms achieve what is known in robotics as closed-loop control. This means that the team used microscope images to measure precisely the location and movements of the worm at a given moment and incorporated that feedback into their decision-making process to accurately steer it to the next target point.

Using this system, Liu and his team can drive the worm forward, make it turn left and right, execute a U-turn and even navigate a simple maze.

Now that RoboWorm functions, Liu and his team envision two possible directions for it.

“Firstly, this would be helpful to biologists who might want to make the worm go somewhere it would not normally want to go. These worms naturally seek out heat and avoid bad-smelling substances; with this system we could see what happens if they do the opposite,” he says.

“But I could also see applications for a synthetic micro-robot that could be activated by a similar process.”

While many groups around the world have developed micro-robots that can crawl, swim or even grip tiny objects, most are currently controlled using a magnetic or acoustic field. Using light might open up new possibilities, perhaps even including medical robots that could be deployed into the human body.

“This is a proof-of-concept demonstration. RoboWorm is not truly a robot yet, but it could be one day.”

– This story was originally published on the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering News Site on July 28, 2021 by Tyler Irving

We are pleased to announce six recent faculty promotions in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering. Congratulations to Patrick Lee and Scott Sanner for earning tenure and being promoted to Associate Professor. The Department is also celebrating Jason Bazylak’s promotion to Professor, Teaching Stream and Tobin Filleter, Axel Guenther, and Xinyu Liu being promoted to Professor.

Patrick Lee

Dr. Patrick Lee, PhD, PEng is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering (MIE) at the University of Toronto. Dr. Lee began his professional career at The Dow Chemical Company in 2008.  He was a Research Scientist and Project Leader in Dow’s Research and Development organization. He then joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at The University of Vermont as an assistant professor in 2014. Since joining UVM, he created his own research platform on the lightweight and smart composite structures.  He joined the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at The University of Toronto in July, 2018.

Dr. Lee’s research areas focus on polymer foam processing and characterization, and processing-structure-property relationships of nano-composites.  He has 61 journal papers, over 100 refereed conference abstracts/papers, 2 book chapters, and 20 filed/issued patent applications. He is the PI or co-PI on domestically and internationally awarded grants from various government agencies and industries. Among his honors, Dr. Lee received the G.H. Duggan Medal from Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering (CSME) in 2020, the AKCSE Early Achievement Award in 2019, the US National Science Foundation Early Faculty Career Development Award (NSF CAREER) in 2018, the Polymer Processing Society (PPS) Morand Lambla award in 2018, the Hanwha Advanced Materials Non-Tenured Faculty Award in 2017, and 3 best paper awards from the Society of Plastics Engineer (2005, 2 in 2011).

 

Scott Sanner

Scott Sanner is an Associate Professor in Industrial Engineering, Cross-appointed in Computer Science, and a faculty affiliate of the Vector Institute. Previously he was an Assistant Professor at Oregon State University and before that a Principal Researcher at National ICT Australia (NICTA) and Adjunct Faculty at the Australian National University.

Professor Sanner’s research spans a broad range of topics from the data-driven fields of Machine Learning and Information Retrieval to the decision-driven fields of Artificial Intelligence and Operations Research. Scott has applied the analytic and algorithmic tools from these fields to diverse application areas such as conversational recommender systems, adaptive user interfaces, and Smart Cities applications including predictive health analytics, transport optimization, power systems security, and residential HVAC control.

 

Jason Bazylak

Jason Bazylak brings engineering, education, and design experience to his role at the University of Toronto. He coordinates an award winning first year design course (Engineering Strategies and Practice), conducts research into reducing the under-representation of women and Indigenous people in engineering, and is the Dean’s Advisor on Indigenous Initiatives. Professor Bazylak started his career as a manufacturing engineer in the new product development group of a large telecommunications company; then joined the University of Victoria, first as an engineering co-op education coordinator, and later as an engineer-in-residence. He joined the University of Toronto in 2008 as a teaching stream professor with a focus on design education. In 2017 he was named an inaugural Hart Teaching Innovation Professor, for his work to increase engineering engagement with Indigenous students and communities, and in 2020 was awarded the Joan E. Foley Quality of Student Experience Award by the U of T Alumni Association.

 

 

Tobin Filleter

Tobin Filleter is a Professor and the Associate Chair of Graduate Studies in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering, the Associate Director of IANDIT and the Co-Director of the recently created University of Toronto Center for 2D Materials (UT2D). Prior to joining the MIE department at U of T, Dr. Filleter was a postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Northwestern University (2009-2012). Dr. Filleter received a BSc (Eng.) in Engineering Physics from Queen’s University (2003) and PhD in Physics from McGill University (2009). During his PhD Dr. Filleter also spent time in Germany as a visiting scientist at the INM-Leibniz Institute for New Materials.

Professor Filleter’s research interests are in nanomechanics of materials. Specific areas of research include nanotribology, mechanics of 2D materials, nanocomposites, and non-destructive testing. He has authored papers in many top international journals including Nature, Nature Materials, Science Advances, and Nature Communications. He is the recipient of several major awards including the Erwin Edward Hart Professorship, CSME I.W. Smith Award, and Ontario Early Researcher Award.

 

Axel Guenther

Dr.  Axel Guenther is an internationally recognized mechanical and biomedical engineer with expertise in biomedical nano/microdevices for applications in micro physiological systems and biofabrication strategies for soft materials and human tissue substitutes. His team has invented several 3D bioprinting approaches to mimic nature’s ability to rapidly achieve the controlled hierarchical organization of cells and biomolecules. These include a handheld 3D printer that can in situ deliver skin precursor sheets for the treatment of full-thickness burn wounds. His team also introduced one of the first organ-on-a-chip platforms, a microfluidic device for the functional characterization of intact small blood vessels. Dr. Guenther is the founding Co-Director of the Center for Research and Applications in Fluidic Technologies (CRAFT), a nationally leading collaborative research centre between the National Research Council of Canada and the University of Toronto. He has been recognized by the Safwat Zaky Research Leader and Inventor of the Year awards at the University of Toronto.

 

 

Xinyu Liu

Xinyu Liu is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering. Prior to joining the University of Toronto, he was an Associate Professor and the Canada Research Chair in Microfluidics and BioMEMS (tier II) in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at McGill University. He also serves as an Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, IEEE Robotics & Automation Letters, and the International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems.

Xinyu’s research interests are at the interfaces of microfluidics, bioMEMS (bio-microelectromechanical systems), and robotics. His research group is developing integrated micro/nanodevices and systems to target a variety of exciting applications in biology, medicine, and environment. Applications of their recent technologies include point-of-care diagnostics, large-scale gene screening, neural basis of behaviour, high-throughput drug screening, and environmental pollution monitoring.

-Published July 20, 2021 by Lynsey Mellon, lynsey@mie.utoronto.ca

Over the 2020-2021 academic year we all had to adapt to the online learning environment, and teaching assistants played an integral role in making the transition a smooth one. In recognition of the outstanding work of our TAs, we are pleased to announce the winners of the MIE Teaching Assistant Awards, which celebrate the hard work, dedication, and creativity our TAs showed in bringing labs and tutorials online throughout the year. This year, we are celebrating a number of individual TA Award winners as well as TA Group Award recipients. Congratulations to all the winners and thank you to all our TAs for your efforts during this unprecedented school year!

Individual Awards

Maryam Daryalal (MIE 335: Algorithms and Numerical Methods – Winter 2021)

Maryam Daryalal is a fourth-year PhD candidate in industrial engineering supervised by Professor Merve Bodur. Her area of study is Operations Research (OR) with a focus on decision-making under uncertainty.

“I was very conscious of the pandemic fatigue and isolation that students may have been experiencing throughout the course,” said Maryam, “In addition to making sure they understood the material I also tried to dedicate some time to talking to my students on a personal level as I wanted to help keep them positive. This helps to make the classroom environment both welcoming and productive.”

Maryam emulated the open-door policy she had in place in previous years by creating a simple online booking system linked to her calendar that students could use to set an individual meeting any time that she was available.

“My favourite part of teaching is the ‘Ah, I see!’ moments when a student understands the concept I have been guiding them towards. I am always excited to see my students learn.”

Assem Ibrahim Elzaabalawy (MIE222: Mechanics of Solids I – Winter 2021, MIE507HS: Heating, Ventilating, and Air Conditioning (HVAC) – Winter 2021)

Assem Elzaabalawy joined MIE in September 2017 to begin a PhD and defended his thesis in June 2021 working under the supervision of Professor Shaker Meguid. He had his first TA appointment in September 2018 and has gone on to help many MIE students understand difficult concepts and achieve their own successes.

“The online course delivery was new and challenging for all of us,” Assem said, “I did my best to ensure my students got the same feeling of sitting in front of a blackboard in a tutorial room and that it was easy for them to reach me outside of scheduled tutorials.”

Assem used OneNote and solved problems in his own handwriting to walk students through the solutions. This method helps students to understand the sequence of events rather than just seeing a previously prepared slide with the full solution. He also created an open session on Bb Collaborate to act as an office hours replacement. Students could reach out to Assem and set a time to meet on Bb Collaborate to address their questions.

“I really enjoy teaching and appreciate the bond created with my students over the semester. It makes me very proud and honored to be receiving the MIE TA Award this year, given the current circumstances and online nature of teaching. I am pleased that my effort has paid off in making things easier for students.”

Berk Gorgulu (MIE360: Systems Modelling and Simulation – Fall 2020, MIE 335: Algorithms and Numerical Methods – Winter 2021)

Berk Gorgulu is a third-year PhD candidate working under the supervision of Vahid Sarhangian. His research focuses on data-driven modelling of service/healthcare operations and supply chain management. His current projects focus on the patient transition from acute care to rehabilitation and examining operational interventions to improve patient flow and outcomes.

“Not being able to interact with students face to face was the biggest challenge in being a TA for this course,” Berk said. “It’s difficult to know how to adjust the speed of the tutorial or which materials need to be repeated when you can’t see how the students are reacting.”

Berk made a point of using a combination of online tools to better connect with students. Bb Collaborate worked best for the labs and tutorials as the sessions could be easily recorded and stored for students to access at a later date. For office hours, Berk preferred to use Zoom as it allowed for students to be admitted one at a time and have the opportunity to get their questions answered one-on-one.

“It is an honour to be receiving this award. I am very glad that I made a positive contribution to the students’ learning process. It is an amazing feeling to see your efforts are recognized by the students.”

Jamie (Ji Eun) Lee (Mechanics of Solids II – Winter 2021)

Jamie Lee is a PhD candidate working with Professor Hani Naguib whose research is focused on developing smart materials with both piezoelectric and electromagnetic responsive characteristics by altering its properties on the nano scale.

Leading online tutorials was sometimes difficult for Jamie as she was unable to see her students’ reactions. Instead of gauging which concepts needed additional clarification from visual cues, Jamie would make sure to pause and ask how the class was doing throughout the tutorial.

“I tried to give lots of opportunities for students to voice their concerns, although there are some shy students who won’t feel comfortable speaking up,” she said. “To help combat that issue I also set up an anonymous forum for the course. While this isn’t a traditional way to connect with students, I think it was really helpful for students that were more hesitant to reach out and I received a lot of questions.”

“I feel so appreciated and very grateful to have been recognized. I am thrilled that I have been able to have a positive impact on the students!”

 

John McGroarty (MIE 315: Design for the Environment – Winter 2021)

John McGroarty is currently working towards completing his MASc thesis. He is a member of the Water and Energy Research Lab led by Professor Amy Bilton and his research focuses on the development of nanocomposite materials to be used in oil spill clean ups.

“The biggest challenge was not getting the same visual feedback from students as when we are in the in person. Online teaching can sometimes it can feel like talking into the void, but I always started each tutorial with an icebreaker game to try build a little bit of a connection and fun atmosphere,” said John.

John has held plenty of leadership roles throughout his time at U of T and knows how important it is to build relationships at Skule. As an undergraduate, he was heavily involved in Frosh week, acting as Head Frosh Leader twice, and also acted as both Vocal Director and Show Director for Skule Nite. Getting involved in this way highlighted how much he enjoys interacting with students and leading them through new experiences.

“It feels great to be recognized with this award. I’m happy to know that I was able to help my students be successful and do my job well. I’m looking forward to continuing my teaching experience.”

Zhen Qin (MIE342: Circuits with Applications to Mechanical Engineering Systems – Fall 2020)

Zhen Qin is a third-year PhD candidate working under Professor Xinyu Liu. His research currently focuses on low-cost, paper-based biosensors for disease diagnosis. Zhen was the head lab TA for MIE342 in the Fall 2020 semester.

“It was a big challenge to redesign the labs to fit the LabsLand online platform, but we were able to create a good experience for our students and it was very satisfying to see the students successfully complete the labs and demonstrate they learned the content of the course. It made all the work worth it,” said Zhen.

Zhen and the TA team were working with students across time zones and made sure to maintain strong lines of communication with both the students and each other to make sure students questions and concerns were addressed in a timely manner.

“I feel truly honoured to receive this award. Being acknowledged in this way motivates me to make sure my teaching is of the highest quality to help more students succeed.”

Group Awards

MIE368: Analytics in Action – Fall 2020

Aaron Babier, Craig Fernandes, and Ian Zhu

“Aaron, Craig and Ian worked as a well-oiled machine in this hands-on industrial engineering course. Being virtual this year demanded much more effort, excellent communication and organization skills, and adaptability. They rose to the occasion and thanks to their efforts supporting our students the final projects were among the best I’ve seen.”  – Professor Timothy Chan

MIE303: Mechanical and Thermal Energy Conversion Processes (Fall 2020) & MIE311: Thermal Energy Conversion (Winter 2021)

Taylr Cawte, Eric Chadwick, Jason Chan, Raymond Guan, Hisan Shafaque, Pranay Shrestha and Vikram Soni

“In the history of the MIE heat engines lab, we have never had video content to benchmark experiments, document, or provide training – let alone videos of this incredible quality. These TAs have left an incredible legacy – a resource that moved our courses into unprecedented online delivery and will continue to serve TAs, faculty, and students for years to come.” – Professor Aimy Bazylak

Learn more about how the MIE303 & 311 TA Team created the virtual labs in the article From the front of the classroom to behind the camera: How a team of teaching assistants brought MIE303 & MIE311 online

MIE313: Heat and Mass Transfer – Winter 2021

Mehdi Ataei, Maryam Ebrahimizar, Morteza Javid and Behrang Mohajer

“Mehdi, Maryam, Morteza and Behrang are perhaps one of the best teams I have ever worked with during my last 12 years teaching in MIE. Not only do they go above and beyond to help and support the students, they demonstrate leadership, and more importantly innovation in educational technologies.” –  Dr. Hanif Montazeri, Instructor

MIE364: Methods of Quality Control and Improvement – Winter 2021

Amine Aboussalah, Victor Lo and Gaowei Xu

“The team’s collective support and coordination made it easy to know that my concerns and questions were being heard by the whole team. My learning experience was excellent, and I feel lucky to have been able to experience studying under this group of leaders.” – Scott Oxholm, IndE 2T2

-Published July 20, 2020 by Lynsey Mellon, lynsey@mie.utoronto.ca

Three U of T Engineering professors have been inducted as Fellows of the Canadian Engineering Education Association (CEEA-ACEG): 

• Professor Jason Bazylak (MIE, ISTEP)
• Professor Alan Chong (ISTEP) 
• Professor Deborah Tihanyi (ISTEP) 

The honour recognizes noteworthy service to engineering education, engineering leadership, or engineering design education. This year’s inductees join four other U of T Engineering professors where were inducted as CEEA Fellows in 2020. 

Bazylak has been involved with the CEEA from its very earliest stages, beginning with its genesis in the Canadian Design Engineering Network (CDEN). 

“As a very junior engineering educator, I got to learn from pioneers in the field of engineering education,” he says. “To now be counted as a Fellow of the association along with these pioneers humbles me, but also motivates me to continue to strive to contribute to the field.” 

One of the themes of Bazylak’s research and practice in engineering education has been the strategic use of technology in the classroom, something he says has changed a lot in the past decade. 

“I remember using a handheld audio voice recorder to make recordings of my lectures for students to review outside of class,” he says. “Now, lecture capture is commonplace. So are online lectures and office hours, digital textbooks and online discussion board learning communities.” 

“While the pandemic shone a spotlight on these technologies, I think they were useful before it started, and will continue to be important afterward, in order to achieve the goal of making learning equitable to all.” 

Bazylak has been a key voice on issues related to equity, diversity and inclusion of traditionally underrepresented people in STEM. As the Dean’s Advisor on Indigenous Initiatives and a member of the Eagles’ Longhouse Indigenous Initiatives Steering Committee, Bazylak was a key author of the Blueprint for Action, a report that included 34 calls to action for the Faculty to progress towards reconciliation. 

Representation of women in STEM is also a key issue for Bazylak. 

“I am extremely proud of the progress that the University of Toronto has made in female representation in our undergraduate engineering program,” he says. “At roughly 40% female enrolment we are double the national average.” 

In the future, Bazylak will partner with other faculty members from U of T Engineering and beyond to study the obstacles deterring more female high school students from choosing to study engineering both at the undergraduate and the graduate level. 

 He is also looking forward to the creation of an Indigenous Office with the Faculty, which will further coordinate reconciliation activities, including those raised by the Blueprint for Action. 

– This story was originally published on the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering News Site on July 15, 2021 by Tyler Irving