Canada's Largest Engineering School

An international research team led by Waterloo Engineering has found a way to turn plastic waste into the main ingredient in vinegar using sunlight.

Their discovery could help reduce plastic pollution, especially in water, while also producing acetic acid, a chemical widely used in food production, chemical manufacturing and energy applications.

Tech startup Rotostitch, an automated textile manufacturing company, raised USD $1 million in a pre-seed funding round to accelerate development of its next-generation textile production platform.

Co-founded in 2025 by Waterloo Engineering alum Leah McClure (BASc ’24, mechanical engineering) and Anson Tsang, Rotostitch is on a mission to reinvent garment construction with greater efficiency, starting with the stitch.

Work by researchers at Waterloo Engineering demonstrates how advanced algebra can help reveal the deep patterns and symmetry at the heart of music.

Dr. Olga Ibragimova, a former PhD student in computational mechanics, and Dr. Chrystopher Nehaniv, a professor of systems design engineering, used group theory - a branch of mathematics that studies symmetry and transformations - to examine melody.