News

Three recent Waterloo Engineering alumni have made it onto the James Dyson Award’s international Top 20 shortlist which recognizes innovation by current and recent design engineering students.  

Colin Bolt, Benjamin Beazley and Jake Chateauneuf (all BASc ‘23, mechanical and mechatronics engineering) have been shortlisted for their product WhaleSafe, a rope on-demand fishing device that stops whales from getting tangled up and dying in lobster and crab fishing trap ropes. 

Waterloo Engineering professor Dr. Alexander Wong was featured on a CBC News TV segment to discuss how AI could play a vital role in Canada’s rural healthcare system. 

Wong, who holds the Canada Research Chair for Artificial Intelligence, said that AI will improve healthcare efficiencies across the country, but that rural Canadians will see the greatest impact from AI-driven technologies.  

Waterloo Engineering’s outreach programs have won an award honouring their contributions to the Nigerian community.

Presented by the group Nigerians in the Region of Waterloo (NIROW) at their annual Independence Day celebration, Waterloo Engineering Outreach (WEO) received the 2023 Community Allyship award. 

Waterloo Engineering alum and PhD candidate Robert Chlumsky (BASc ’15, MASc ’18 ) is a recent recipient of the Jain Family Award for Entrepreneurship.

The award, made possible by a gift from the Vijay Anand Foundation to encourage student entrepreneurship at Waterloo, provides Chlumsky with valuable financial assistance and confirmation that his hydrologic modelling research has significant potential.

Cutting-edge technologies gave the world fake news, but researchers from the University of Waterloo’s Faculty of Engineering are developing even newer technology to stop it.

According to Chien-Chih Chen, one of the project’s lead researchers and a PhD candidate in electrical and computer engineering, the innovative system he and his colleagues have developed over the past three years is “unique,” and relies on something already famous for underpinning Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies — blockchain.

Having weathered the COVID-19 pandemic far from home, Waterloo Engineering alum and Muay Thai instructor, Qianshu Wang (BASc ‘19, Nanotechnology Engineering) is back in Waterloo figuring out his next move. 

As he reboots for his next adventure (he’s interested in semi-conductor engineering in Germany or the Netherlands), Wang highlights his involvement with the Recent Engineering Alumni Council (REAC) for helping him through some challenging times over the past couple of years.  

Alexa Megan Holder's recreational love of wild waters grew into an academic interest that guided her towards Waterloo’s Faculty of Engineering for a Bachelor of Architectural Studies (BAS).  

This fall, Holder crosses the stage at convocation to mark the completion of her undergraduate degree, though her studies at Waterloo will continue. Holder recently began her Master of Architecture (MArch) degree in the Collaborative Water Program, with funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). For her thesis, she plans to focus on how building design can mitigate flood related issues and disasters.  

Kitchener-based healthtech startup FluidAI Medical announced that it has raised $15 million in Series A funding to drive growth in AI-driven healthcare solutions. 

FluidAI (formerly NERv Technology) was co-founded in 2014 by Waterloo Engineering alumni Youssef Helwa (BASc ‘15, nanotechnology engineering; MASc ‘18, electrical and computer engineering) and Amr Abdelgawad (BASc ‘16, nanotechnology engineering; MBET ‘17, business, entrepreneurship and technology).  

In April this year, the University of Waterloo’s Faculty of Engineering Outreach team launched a free community outreach program called Travelling STEM.

Over the summer, the pilot program visited Indigenous communities across Ontario to share exciting STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) possibilities with youth from kindergarten to grade 11 in their home communities.  

The University of Waterloo tied 158 overall in the recently released Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings 2024. Waterloo also placed 7th among 31 Canadian institutions.  

THE evaluated more than 1,900 universities around the world using an updated rankings methodology. Waterloo’s strongest indicators this year were research productivity, research excellence, research influence, patents and international staff.