News

The University community continues to share memories and acknowledge the impact of Pearl Sullivan at Waterloo in the wake of her passing two weeks ago. A champion for Waterloo and for Engineering, Pearl made an incredible impact on this institution, our people and partners during her service as a professor, department chair and dean as shown by the continued outpouring of support and tributes from her students, colleagues, and members of the community.

Two Canadian engineering deans wrote a powerful opinion piece for the CBC mourning the École Polytechnique's victims and reflecting on the trailblazing women in engineering since December 6, 1989.

Mary Wells, dean of Waterloo Engineering, and Suzanne Kresta, dean of the College of Engineering at the University of Saskatchewan, shared their thoughts on the tragic loss of engineering talent and the “engineering superheroes” who have worked towards the goal of equal representation in the profession.

Work by three researchers at Waterloo Engineering is featured in the latest issue of WaterResearch, a publication produced by the Water Institute at the University of Waterloo.

Alison Brooks has been honoured as 2020’s Architect of the Year by Dezeen, an influential architecture and design online magazine based in London, England.

Brooks, a 1988 Waterloo architecture alumnus, received the recognition from Dezeen’s international jury.

A student design team at the University of Waterloo recently earned a gold medal at an international competition involving synthetic biology.

REMINE was one of almost 250 teams from around the world competing at the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) contest, which was held virtually due to the COVID-19 crisis.

It wasn’t until the December 6 killing of 14 women at École Polytechnique de Montréal that Mary Wells realized the significance of her gender in the profession.

“I consciously remember thinking that I was also a woman in engineering and could have easily been one of those women in the room,” says Wells, dean of Waterloo Engineering. “I was completely shocked and horrified by what had happened and it is etched in my mind forever.”

Pearl Sullivan, Waterloo's former dean of engineering and the first woman to hold the position, died on November 28 after a 12-year battle with cancer.

Passionate about supporting students, she was dedicated to ensuring they had a full understanding of engineering principles as well as the tools and facilities they needed to succeed.   

It is with great sadness that we share the news of Professor Igor Ivković's death on November 27. 

A graduate student at Waterloo Engineering was recently recognized for his work at a virtual conference for experts in the blockchain field.

Behkish Nassirzadeh, who is doing a master’s degree in computer engineering under the supervision of Professor Vijay Ganesh, won the award for innovation at the UBRI (University Blockchain Research Initiative) Connect 2020 event hosted by technology company Ripple.

Five former nanotechnology engineering students at the University of Waterloo have come a long way since they came together over a shared interest in optics and frustration with the poor quality of their smartphone photographs.

Just over a year after they teamed up, their startup technology company, Scope Photonics, earned international attention with the announcement today that it is a worldwide runner-up for the 2020 James Dyson Award for student inventors.