New initiatives for industrial and international partnerships are enabling Waterloo engineers to develop strategic research collaborations in areas such as wireless communications, the mobile internet, additive manufacturing, advanced robotics, biomedical engineering and sustainable energy.
The Engineering Research Office (ERO) proactively builds relationships with funding agencies, potential sponsors and other stakeholders, pairing the university’s leading engineering researchers with government and industry, to advance new technologies to improve the human condition.
Waterloo Engineering maintains research partnerships with close to 800 Canadian companies and 300 companies internationally, targeting strategic research partnerships with leading global universities.
Several Senate-approved research centres, including the Centre for Advanced Trenchless Technology, the Waterloo Institute for Sustainable Energy, the Waterloo Centre for Automotive Research and the Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology form part of Waterloo Engineering’s commitment to research excellence.
Areas of Concentration

Controls and precision tooling, lightweight materials, structural crashworthiness, advanced materials.
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Digital design and fabrication technologies, environmental issues and new material economies, globalization, urbanization.
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Bio-compatibility and in-vitro modelling, human movement, ergonomics, wearable technology.
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Advancing IoT research to connect and exchange data.
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Nano-biosystems, nano-electronics, nano-instrumentation, nano-materials.
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Robotics and machine intelligence, machine learning.
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Human machine interaction, autonomous robotics, rahabilitation and assistive robotics, micro and nano robitics, and sensing and control.
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Transporation networks, smart buildings, smart communities, and sensors and devices.
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News
Prof and students wear the Iron Ring with pride
A Waterloo Engineering professor bestowed the Iron Ring on her students at this year's Iron Ring ceremony on campus. Now in its 100th year, the ceremony is an important rite of passage for Canada's professional engineers, reminding them to work with integrity.
Dr. Nadine Ibrahim from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering shares why the Iron Ring tradition holds enduring relevance for future engineers and the societies they work in.
Engineering students earn global leadership fellowships
Three Waterloo Engineering students have earned a national fellowship that supports global leadership and entrepreneurship.
Mechatronics Engineering student Beaumont Qu and Software Engineering students Barton Lu and Steven Yang were selected for the 2025 Cansbridge Fellowship, a competitive program that provides hands-on international experience through internships in Asia.
Finding will protect coral reefs from microplastics pollution
A research team at Waterloo Engineering has taken an important step in the protection of fragile coral reefs by uncovering how and why microplastics in the ocean stick to them.
For the first time, the researchers identified mucus naturally secreted by coral as the mechanism responsible for accumulation of the harmful pollutants on reefs, diverse ecosystems that provide food, shelter and breeding grounds for millions of species.