News

Researchers have developed a faster, cheaper way to coat liquid medication, an invention that could improve how drugs are delivered in the body.

The new encapsulation technology, developed by engineers at the University of Waterloo, uses gravity and other natural forces to wrap drops as they fall through a thin layer of liquid shell floating on a base liquid.

Once hardened, or cured, by exposure to ultraviolet light, the shell houses and protects the liquid core inside.

The research in Professor David Rose’s laboratory in the Department of Biology is focused on the human enzymes that recognize and act upon carbohydrates. These enzymes play key roles in multiple aspects of health and disease, including deriving glucose from components of our diets, such as starch and sucrose, and in the synthesis of glycoproteins (proteins that consist of carbohydrates as well as amino acids).

Physician-angel and VC firm fuel ongoing studies and product development.

NERv Technology Inc., an innovative medtech venture co-founded by a number of University of Waterloo alumni, has secured $1 million CAD in pre-seed funding.

Professor Todd Holyoak is an expert in the dynamic aspects of the enzyme structure-function relationship, or “conformational plasticity” in enzymology and how these dynamic aspects of enzyme structure can be altered/influenced to alter and enzyme function. Currently, the Holyoak lab is exploring the structure-function relationship in several diverse enzyme families with a current focus upon the GTP-dependent phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinases (PEPCK) and the IgA1 protease family of bacterial proteins.

There are many proteins that aid in COX assembly. Professor Moira Glerum was the first to identify many of these so-called COX assembly factors in yeast, which in turn facilitated the identification of the molecular bases for a number of different COX deficiencies in patients by molecular and medical geneticists. 

Four professors at Waterloo Engineering, including WIN Director Sushanta Mitra and WIN member Kevin Musselman, were recently awarded $570,000 in provincial funding to build their research teams and pay for research-related infrastructure.

Three WIN members have been named fellows of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC) and members of the Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists.

They are among 93 new fellows elected by their peers for outstanding scholarly, scientific, and artistic achievement and 46 new members of the College across Canada announced today.

Waterloo’s new RSC fellows and members are:

Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada

Researchers at Waterloo Engineering have created a new material that can go from a soft gel to a hard solid and back again at the same temperature.

The switchability of the material - a combination of supercooled melted salt and polymers that the researchers call sal-gel - means it has two stable and reversible solid states for potential use in a range of technologies including soft robotics, adhesion and adhesives, and aeronautics.

Researchers at Waterloo Engineering have dramatically improved the durability of fuel cells, paving the way for the clean technology to replace gasoline engines in vehicles.

Making fuel cells last at least 10 times longer means they could be simplified and produced at a far lower cost. If mass-produced, that would make them economically practical to power cars and trucks.

Department of Chemistry Professor and WIN member Pavle Radovanovic is one of six University of Waterloo researchers who are receiving a total of $3.8 million to collaborate with Canadian-based companies and government organizations on strategic research projects.