Innovative engineering projects awarded NSERC funding

Monday, February 11, 2013

A research project that may significantly boost clean biofuel production in Canada is among three Waterloo Engineering initiatives to receive funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

NSERC is awarding $486,000 to Perry Chou and Murray Moo-Young, both of chemical engineering, to help develop new strains of bacteria and bioprocessing techniques to convert cheap feedstock into a clean, renewable and sustainable biofuel.

Norman Zhou of mechanical and mechatronics engineering and Mark Servos of Waterloo's biology department will receive almost $492,000 to investigate the removal of drinking water contaminants with innovative nanowire membranes. And Weihua Zhuang of electrical and computer engineering will receive $558,000 to develop lower power consumption in existing wireless communication networks by improving their efficiency.
 
NSERC Strategic Project Grants support early-stage projects and aim to encourage collaboration among academic researchers, industry and government partners. The goal of these grants is to increase research and training in areas that could strongly influence Canada’s economy, society or environment in the next 10 years. [news release]