Canada's Largest Engineering School

Biotech company HeadFirst is improving how concussions are screened in contact sports with a simple spit test.

The company was co-founded in 2022 by University of Waterloo alum Andrew Cordssen-David (BSc ’22, MBET ’23) and Dr. Shazia Tanvir, a professor in Waterloo’s chemical engineering department. The HeadFirst device analyzes biomarkers in saliva that indicate brain injury and delivers results in real-time.

A University of Waterloo professor has received $100,000 from the Scotiabank Climate Action Research Fund to advance bacteria-powered technology that turns mixed waste streams into low-carbon products. 

Dr. Christian Euler from the Department of Chemical Engineering is investigating how landfill gas by-products and other waste materials can be transformed into valuable bioplastics at industrial scale.

Graduate students swept the top three spots in this year’s Waterloo Engineering contest to recognize striking photographs taken during academic research.

The first-place prize of $1,000 went to chemical engineering student Estatira Amirieh for a forest-like image that emerged from a laboratory bench, not nature. Its delicate structures were created through electrospinning, a process in which a liquid polymer solution is pulled by electric fields into ultra-thin threads that solidify as they travel through the air.