Category Archives: BioEngineering

In the past year as President of CIM, Ive had the privilege of engaging in multiple conversations with industry leaders. In these conversations, Ive asked them what their main challenges are. Consistently, availability of talent comes out as the number one challenge.

This is, of course, not surprising to anyone reading this magazine. The anecdotal evidence is everywhere, and it is not limited to technical professionals. It spans the full lifecycle of metals production from drillers on the exploration front to technicians in the concentrators and refineries. This is supported by research completed by Mining Industry Human Resources Council (MiHR). MiHR tracks 70 selected occupations, which are considered the most relevant to the mining industry, and in its 2019 labour market survey, Canadian companies indicated that there were 1,820 unfilled vacancies in these categories across the country. With increased industry activity and the growing demand for decarbonization metals, that number has surely increased. MiHR also tracks Canadian university enrolment in the key industry engineering disciplines (metallurgical engineering, mining engineering, geological engineering). All three have seen significant reductions in the past five years and the negative trend continues.

The continued decrease in mining-related enrolment is in spite of the millions of dollars the industry has spent trying to communicate the positive benefits of mining to attract students. Every mining industry association and institute across Canada and the globe has developed programs promoting mining to students and to society in general. Generally, these programs have not moved the dial.

My view, which is admittedly a controversial view, is that the word mining does not reflect what we do and is a brand too damaged to save. Legacy perceptions combined with modern reality TV shows that portray mining as an old dirty industry are making it almost impossible to change societys views. Our infographics on how many metals can be found in a cell phone or an electric car are just not resonating. Is it time for a rebrand?

Lets start with the Cambridge Dictionary definition of mining: the industry or activity of removing substances such as coal or metal from the ground by digging. Is this really what we do? Real estate developers, highway builders, tunnelling contractors all remove substances from the ground by digging. Are they calling themselves miners?

Now, lets look at the definition of branding: the activity of connecting a product with a particular name, symbol, etc., or with particular features or ideas, in order to make people recognize and want to buy it. Branding helps shape peoples perceptions of companies, their products, or individuals.

The mining brand is connected to digging holes and blasting Yukon riverbanks in search of gravity gold. Who wants to buy that brand? Not me.

The reality is that we are an industry that develops and deploys advanced technology in the search for, and the production of minerals and metals. We utilize ground penetrating radar, magnetic resonance, artificial intelligence, scanning electron microscopes, LIDAR, X-ray fluorescence, complex mathematical and financial modelling, bioengineering and 3D design software to name just a few. We also build and operate some of the most powerful machines on the planet and we build complex multi-billion-dollar projects in some of the harshest environments on the globe.

We do all of these things with the final goal of producing the minerals we need to grow our food and the metals we need to sustain our modern way of life, including the metals required to decarbonize our economy in a race against climate change. If we are to attract the future workforce, we need to rebrand as high-tech producers of minerals and metals.

This simple action will not solve all our problems, but I believe it is a necessary first step in building positive and attractive perceptions of our industry.

P.S. As this is my last Presidents note, I would like to thank the amazing staff at CIM. The pandemic created historical challenges for CIM. The team persevered with equal parts passion, skill and professionalism to ensure the continuation of this exceptional Canadian institution.

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What's in a name? - The challenge of finding the future workforce in mining - CIM Magazine

The University of Waterloo has a long history of supporting corporate innovation through talent and partnerships, like the Rogers 5G partnership, and through support systems such as the Velocity incubator.

While 74 per cent of Velocity startups have one or more founders that studied or worked at the University of Waterloo, Velocity also attracts global startups. In 2021, the incubator, which can accommodate up to 20 new companies per year, received more than 200 qualified applications.

Velocitys connectivity with the University of Waterloo is one of the incubators key strengths. The University of Waterloo streamlines engagement with amazing students and renowned research groups while Velocity supplies founders with funding, business connections, expert advice and space to quickly and cost-effectively turn prototypes into scalable businesses, says Adrien Ct, executive director at Velocity.

Able Innovations, one of Velocitys portfolio companies, is solving the painful and labour intensive process of patient transfers by developing robotic technology that enables effortless, single-caregiver, safe and dignified transfers. Jayiesh Singh, Co-Founder and CEO of Able Innovations, met Colin Russell, Waterloos managing director, partnerships, while Colin was leading Waterloos Centre for Bioengineering & Biotechnology (CBB). Through Russell and the CBB, Singh connected with experts, investors and partners, such as the Research Institute for Aging. He also hired several co-op students from Waterloo some later joined the company as full-time staff and eventually landed $50,000 from the Velocity Fund and Velocity Health Tech Fund, and an invitation to join the incubator.

Through Velocity, Able was able to grow its network of advisors, mentors as well as the extended network of aligned investors and commercial partners, Singh says. The high quality of the Velocity network has helped Able substantially in its journey thus far.

Proximity to the University of Waterloo was key to Able Innovations growth. The team is currently working closely with Professor Amir Khajepour, who leads another autonomous vehicle project: WATonobus.

Rogers is working with Waterloo to realize the business potential of their 5G network and real-time computer resources. Waterloos research is building the technology that makes it possible. Able is working with both partners to realize the business potential of their technology, Russell says. I saw Able grow from a digital concept to a working prototype to building a company that will eventually provide healthcare facilities with fleets of autonomous devices that will support a more sustainable health-care environment.

This collaboration leverages the ground-breaking work with WATonobus and aims to integrate it into healthcare facilities through integration with the ALTA Platform. The ALTA Platform is an autonomous bed that will transfer supine patients who need to be moved from bed to stretcher or stretcher to imaging table in healthcare facilities. Lifting and transporting of patients involves a considerable amount of time and physical labour. While the task of patient transfer is challenging, it is necessary and provides great opportunity for automation. In an industry currently experiencing staff turn-over and high burn-out rates, exacerbated by the ongoing pandemic, technologies like ALTA could help solve worker shortages and provide safer, better care and improve health outcomes for both patients and health-care professionals.

By supporting companies like Able Innovations with access to research, corporate partnerships, funding and space to build and scale their technologies at Velocity, the University of Waterloo is helping strengthen Canadas healthcare tech ecosystem.

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Supporting corporate innovation at every size | Waterloo News - The Iron Warrior

Life is complicated. Even the smallest cells contain a mind-blowing assortment of chemical reactions that allow them to thrive in a chaotic landscape.

If we want to know where to draw the line between life and bubbles of stale old organic soup, it helps to strip away the non-essential extras to expose the core components, and then map how each of them works.

This has been the goal of biochemists for a number of years, who have, over the years, succeeded in designing some surprisingly basic organisms that barely cling to life in a laboratory.

Now, scientists from the J. Craig Venter Institute and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in the US, and the Technische Universitt Dresden in Germany, have taken the next step and constructed a detailed simulation of their latest minimalist microbe.

"What's new here is that we developed a three-dimensional, fully dynamic kinetic model of a living minimal cell that mimics what goes on in the actual cell," says University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign chemist Zaida Luthey-Schulten.

Luthey-Schulten led a team of researchers in analyzing the diverse genetic, metabolic, and structural changes that take place in a replicating culture of synthetic bacteria called JCVI-syn3A.

Simulating the workings of the most basic of organisms, such as species of Mycoplasma or the common microbe Escherichia coli, still requires a few mathematical fudge factors to broadly model the operations of numerous sub-systems. Weaving together the full range of detailed descriptions of everything from the genes up and nutrients down just hasn't been possible, even for these comparatively simple bacteria.

In the early 2000s, researchers at the J. Craig Venter Institute removed as many genes as they could from Mycoplasma mycoides, leaving a version that stood right on the brink of survival.

This synthetic life form, called JCVI-syn1.0, was soon superseded by something even more basic. JCVI-syn3.0.

This updated version contains just 531,000 bases divided among 473 genes. With all of its nutrient needs provided by the laboratory, its bare-bones genome is left to take care of replicating and growing and little else.

Still, JCVI-syn3.0 isn't exactly consistent in its growth, producing a confusing diversity of shapes in its progeny. A few genes were popped back in, resulting in the latest version of the minimal cell: JCVI-syn3A.

Its creators have a solid idea of what genes their synthetic cell contains, though are still working out exactly what each one does.

To make things even more difficult, it's vital knowing how each atom and molecule diffuses through the cell, a description that requires heavy-duty computing power to simulate.

"We developed a three-dimensional, fully dynamic kinetic model of a living minimal cell," says Luthey-Schulten.

"Our model opens a window on the inner workings of the cell, showing us how all of the components interact and change in response to internal and external cues. This model and other, more sophisticated models to come will help us better understand the fundamental principles of life."

The simulation confirmed a few suspicions, however, such as the fact most of the minimalist cell's energy went towards dragging in essential materials across the membranes.

It also gave an accurate description of the timelines of genetic and metabolic reactions, explaining relationships between the rate of production of lipids and proteins in the membrane and changes in the cell's shape.

Since JCVI-syn3A are essentially pared-down versions of a naturally occurring organism, they're just one example of how to minimalize the functions of biology. Life is nothing if not creative in how it overcomes obstacles to survival.

Now that we have a proven model for simulating JCVI-syn3A's growth and development, researchers can build up its complexity again to determine how different genes add to its function.

We might expect new 'lite' versions of not just M. mycoides, but other organisms in the near future. If not completely novel synthetic life forms.

Life might still be complicated, but it just got a whole lot easier to study.

This research was published in Cell.

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Bioengineers Have Modeled The Workings of The World's Most Basic Synthetic Life Form - ScienceAlert

Four Caltech professors, along with one principal staff member from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, have been named as fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). In total, 14 Caltech alumni were named as fellows this year.

AAAS Fellows are a distinguished cadre of scientists, engineers, and innovators who have been recognized for their achievements across disciplines, from research, teaching, and technology, to administration in academia, industry, and government, to excellence in communicating and interpreting science to the public. The 2022 class of AAAS Fellows includes 564 scientists, engineers, and innovators spanning 24 scientific disciplines.

William G. Dunphy

Grace C. Steele Professor of Biology

"For elucidating the complex network of enzymes that commit a cell to mitosiscritical information for understanding DNA replication and preservation of genomic integrity."

Dunphy received his PhD from Stanford in 1985. He joined the Caltech faculty in 1989.

Viviana Gradinaru (BS '05)

Professor of neuroscience and biological engineering; director, Center for Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience

"For extraordinary achievements in bioengineering and neuroscience, including development and sharing of multiple novel tools to enable functional and anatomical access to the vertebrate nervous system."

Gradinaru received her PhD from Stanford in 2010. She joined the Caltech faculty in 2012.

Stephen Mayo (PhD '87)

Bren Professor of Biology and Chemistry; Merkin Institute Professor

"For distinguished contributions to the field of protein design technology."

Mayo received his PhD from Caltech in 1987. He joined the faculty in 1992.

Carol Polanskey (MS '84, PhD '89)

Planetary scientist, JPL

"For distinguished contributions to the field of planetary science, especially the structure and dynamics of asteroids and other small planetary bodies as well as exemplary leadership and development of space science missions."

Polanskey received her PhD from Caltech in 1989.

Paul O. Wennberg

R. Stanton Avery Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry and Environmental Science and Engineering; executive officer for environmental science and engineering; director, Ronald and Maxine Linde Center for Global Environmental Science

"For major scientific advances in atmospheric chemistry."

Wennberg received his PhD from Harvard in 1994. He joined the Caltech faculty in 1998.

In addition to Gradinaru, Mayo, and Polanskey, 11 other Caltech alumni were elected as AAAS fellows this year: Andrea M. Armani (MS '03, PhD '07), Pratim Biswas (PhD '85), Eric Christian (MS '85, PhD '89), Brian C. Freeman (BS '79), Stephen Craig Hadler (BS, '69), Thomas Mark McCleskey (PhD '94), Charles Ofria (PhD '99), Padhraic Smyth (MS '85, PhD '88), Lynmarie K. Thompson (BS '83), Paula I. Watnick (PhD '89), and Yannis Yortsos (MS '74, PhD '79).

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Caltech Faculty Members and JPL Researcher Named as AAAS Fellows - Caltech

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Global ?-Polylysine Market 2021 COVID-19 Impact Analysis and Top Companies as Jnc-Corp, Siveele, Handary, Zhejiang Silver Elephant Bioengineering The...

Job Description

We are seeking a highly motivated Research Fellow with expertise in bioengineering, biomaterials and cellular engineering.

The candidate will be responsible for fabricating materials including nanoparticles and nano-needles for use in genetic engineering of cells. The candidate will also need to independently design and execute experiments, troubleshoot issues, interpret results and give project updates.

We provide a highly competitive remuneration package that commensurates with the qualifications and relevant experience of the successful candidate. The candidate will also be fully supported in their career development in different areas like research, industry, consulting and education.

Qualifications

To apply, please send your CV and contact details of two referees to Dr Andy Tay (bietkpa@nus.edu.sg) Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.

More Information

Location: Kent Ridge CampusOrganization: EngineeringDepartment : Biomedical EngineeringEmployee Referral Eligible: NoJob requisition ID : 8619

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Research Fellow, Biomedical Engineering job with NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE | 279034 - Times Higher Education (THE)