The following theses have been submitted to the Faculty of Science Graduate Office and are available for review by any member of the University. Thesis defences at the University of Waterloo are also open to the campus community.
If you wish to attend a remote defence as an audience member please submit the form linked above. For defences that are held without public disclosure, requests must be submitted at least four business days in advance to allow adequate time for signing the required non-disclosure agreement.
Upcoming Fall 2023 PhD defenses
Tuesday, September 5 at 10:00 a.m.
PhD Candidate: Michael Chapman
Title: Optimizing Small-scale Redshift Space Distortion Measurements in eBOSS for Cosmological Inference
Supervisor: Dr. William Percival
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Physics Building (PHY) Room 352 and Remote
Tuesday, September 5 at 1:00 p.m.
PhD Candidate: Nikhil George
Title: A Metagenomic Examination of Prokaryotic Virus Diversity, Host Interactions, and Genetic Potential Across Municipal Waste Sites
Supervisor: Dr. Laura Hug
Department: Biology
Location: Biology 1 Building (B1) Room 266 and Remote
Wednesday, September 6 at 2:00 p.m.
PhD Candidate: Tyler Lott
Title: Controlled nanometer liquid layer thicknesses for the study of nanomaterials and biospecimens in liquid-cell transmission electron microscopy
Supervisor: Dr. German Sciaini
Department: Chemistry
Location: Chemistry 2 Building (C2) Room 361 and Remote
Thursday, September 7 at 2:00 p.m.
PhD Candidate: Spencer Weinstein
Title: Community-partnered research on subsistence char fisheries near Kugluktuk, Nunavut: novel insights from traditional knowledge and western science
Supervisor: Dr. Heidi Swanson
Department: Biology
Location: Biology 1 Building (B1) Room 266 and Remote
Friday, September 8 at 1:00 p.m.
PhD Candidate: Manuel Soto Davila
Title: Enhancement of the non-specific immune response and disease-resistance in triploid Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) supplemented with probiotics
Supervisor: Dr. Brian Dixon
Department: Biology
Location: Science Teaching Complex (STC) Room 2002 and Remote
Friday, September 8 at 1:00 p.m.
PhD Candidate: Chung-You Shih
Title: Programmable Individual Addressing and Floquet Hamiltonian Dynamics in a Trapped Ion Quantum Processor
Supervisor: Dr. Kazi Rajibul Islam
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Physics Building (PHY) Room 352 and Remote
Monday, September 11 at 12:00 p.m.
PhD Candidate: Abdul Rasheed Mohammed
Title: Advancing Hyperacuity for Vision Screening
Supervisors: Dr. Vengu Lakshminaryanan & Dr. Kaamran Raahemifar
Department: School of Optometry and Vision Science
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Thursday, September 14 at 9:00 a.m.
PhD Candidate: Ramiro Cayuso
Title: Black hole dynamics in Effective Field Theory extensions to General Relativity
Supervisor: Dr. Luis Lehner
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Physics Building (PHY) Room 352
Thursday, September 14 at 1:00 p.m.
PhD Candidate: TC Fraser
Title: An estimation theoretic approach to quantum realizability problems
Supervisors: Dr. Kevin Resch & Dr. Robert Spekkens
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Quantum Nano Centre (QNC) Room 2101
Friday, September 22 at 9:00 a.m.
PhD Candidate: Stefanie Beale
Title: Modeling and managing noise in quantum error correction
Supervisors: Dr. Ray Laflamme & Dr. Joel Wallman
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Physics Building (PHY) Room 308 & Remote
Upcoming Fall 2023 MSc defences
Thursday, September 7 at 1:00 p.m.
MSc Candidate: Jane Ye
Title: The influence of soil moisture, oxygen, and temperature on naphthalene biodegradation and CO2 and CH4 effluxes
Supervisors: Dr. Fereidoun Rezanezhad & Dr. Philippe Van Cappellen
Department: Earth and Environmental Sciences
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Friday, September 8 at 9:30 a.m.
MSc Candidate: Manar Naeem
Title: The Effects of Uniform Acceleration on the Correlation Harvesting
Supervisor: Dr. Robert Mann
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Quantum Nano Centre (QNC) Room 2101
Friday, September 8 at 1:00 p.m.
MSc Candidate: Jedri De Luna
Title: The Evolution of Subhalo Orbits in Galaxy Clusters
Supervisor: Dr. James Taylor
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Physics Building (PHY) Room 308
Friday, September 8, 2023 at 2:00 p.m.
MSc Candidate: Itamar Aharony
Title: Spin-Spin Correlations in the CuAlCr₄S₈ Breathing Pyrochlore
Supervisor: Dr. Michel Gingras
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Special Notes: Held Without Public Disclosure
Monday, September 11 at 9:00 a.m.
MSc Candidate: Christine Nielsen
Title: Phosphorus cycling by stream biofilms exposed to continuous and episodic loading patterns
Supervisor: Dr. Adam Yates
Department: Biology
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Monday, September 11 at 1:00 p.m.
MSc Candidate: Zhiyu Jin
Title: Double-pulse Model for the Study of Red-shifted Spectrum in Multi-frequency Raman Generation
Supervisor: Dr. Donna Strickland
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Tuesday, September 12 at 10:00 a.m.
MSc Candidate: Parth Padia
Title: Closed-loop control system and hardware-aware compilation protocols for quantum simulation with neutral atoms in optical trap arrays
Supervisors: Dr. David Cory & Dr. Alexandre Cooper-Roy
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Friday, September 15 at 9:30 a.m.
MSc Candidate: Laura Rivera Mendez
Title: PACAP Analogues with Potential Applications in Finfish Aquaculture
Supervisor: Dr. Brian Dixon
Department: Biology
Location: Science Teaching Complex (STC) Room 2002 and Remote
Friday, September 15 at 10:00 a.m.
MSc Candidate: Brampton Dakin
Title: How a dry year affects spatial variability of ground thaw and changes the hydrology of a small Arctic watershed
Supervisor: Dr. Dave Rudolph
Department: Earth and Environmental Sciences
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Monday, September 18 at 9:30 a.m.
MSc Candidate: Fatima Abrar
Title: Targeting p62 Palmitoylation as a Potential Therapeutic Strategy towards Huntington Disease
Supervisor: Dr. Dale Martin
Department: Biology
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Monday, September 18 at 1:00 p.m.
MSc Candidate: Mohammad Ayyash
Title: Cats, Rotating Waves and Photons: An Excursion into Light-Matter Interaction
Supervisor: Dr. Matteo Mariantoni
Department: Physics and Astronomy
Location: Quantum Nano Centre (QNC) Room 2101 and Remote Audience
Wednesday, September 20 at 10:00 a.m.
MSc Candidate: Madeleine Prater
Title: An investigation into marine environments in the eastern Canadian Arctic
Supervisor: Dr. Heidi Swanson
Department: Biology
Location: Remote via MS TEAMS
Wednesday, September 20 at 1:00 p.m.
MSc Candidate: Lauryn Pinks
Title: Primary producer mediated effects of light and nutrients on organic matter processing: insights from artificial and natural streams
Supervisor: Dr. Adam Yates
Department: Biology
Location: Optometry Building (OPT) Room 309