The UT3, #2, Gasoline Prototype, competing for team University of Toronto Supermileage from University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada, is seen on the track during day two of the Shell Eco-marathon Americas 2015 in Detroit, Mich., Saturday, April 11, 2015. (Rex Larsen/AP Images for Shell)

April 14, 2015 — Eighty-nine engines revved in Motor City this weekend, but they weren’t racing for gold—they were racing for green.

The University of Toronto Supermileage team won this year’s Shell Eco-Marathon Americas in Detroit, Michigan, with an efficiency of 3,421 miles per gallon—the equivalent of 6.82 millilitres of gasoline per 10 kilometres. That’s less than five tablespoons of gas to drive from the foot of Yonge Street in Toronto to Barrie, Ontario.

U of T squeaked out a win in the very last run of the event to upset the dominant Al Erion team from Université Laval. A perennial favourite, Laval took home the title at the past two events, and five out of six previous years in the highly competitive Prototype Gasoline category.

“Even on that last run I don’t think most of us believed we would come in first, we just thought we might improve,” says Mengqi Wang (ElecE 1T3, MASc 1T6), co-president and electrical lead of the Supermileage team. “It was literally the last possible moment—we were the final car on the track—and we just sneaked past them.”

The surprise win couldn’t have been more dramatic: the team thought they’d had their last run around the 1.4-kilometre track, and were in the fuelling tent having their gas consumption measured and logged with only five minutes left before the track was slated to close.

“We’d already done media interviews about coming in second, and being happy about improving on last year’s performance,” says Prashanth Murali (MechE 1T3+PEY, UTIAS MASc 1T6), the team’s mechanical lead credited with designing and fabricating a much lighter aerobody for this year’s 34-kilogram vehicle. “We were resigned to our fate.”

Then they realized there were only two cars in line at the start. “The official at the start line told us if we lined up right now we could get another run in,” remembers Wang. “We sprinted back to the tent and dragged the car over.”

They finished the run and went back in the fuel tent to measure the vehicle’s temperature and consumption, but because they were the very last car, they had to wait for the official rankings. “We could tell our consumption was low, but we didn’t know where we’d placed,” says Wang. “Half the team was screaming, half the team was trying to get us to calm down.”

This is the third year the Supermileage team has competed in the Shell Eco-marathon, each time in the Prototype Gasoline class, the biggest category at the two-day event. In 2014 they came second after jockeying for the lead with Laval all weekend. “We were neck and neck with them the entire competition,” says Wang. “We knew exactly what we needed to do to get the extra mileage, but we just couldn’t get the last run in.”

That year the team also won a technical innovation prize for their custom-built engine, the only custom engine in the entire competition. They hope to continue to improve on their engine, as well as perfecting a reliable clutch and making improvements to the vehicle’s aerodynamics, including wind-tunnel testing. Wang says the team also has plans to break into the Battery Electric category.

Founded in 2013, the Supermileage team is composed of 25 undergraduate and graduate students from U of T Engineering, and is supervised by Professor Kamran Behdinan (MIE) of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering. Wang and Murali both say they can’t wait to realize the many improvements they have in store for next year’s Eco-marathon—the competition returns to Detroit in 2016, where they hope to defend their title on the same track.

“The Supermileage Team is comprised of dedicated, multidisciplinary students, committed to the success of the team,” says Professor Behdinan. “As the faculty advisor, I had the privilege of knowing the team’s realistic objectives to go beyond  last year’s great success, and achieve first rank in the competition.”

“Our actual goal is to beat the North American record and see how far we can push the record,” says Wang. “All of us were a little disappointed by how close we were with Laval—just like last year, either team could have won. So the goal for us is to really set the bar for the field.”

The international event, which celebrated its 30^th anniversary this year, drew 113 teams from more than 1,000 universities and high schools across the Americas, including participants from Brazil, Guatemala, Mexico and the United States. In addition to gasoline, teams entered futuristic vehicles running on diesel, ethanol, electricity, compressed natural gas, gas-to-liquid fuel and hydrogen power. Teams competed for awards in best fuel economy, safety, design and team spirit.

“In Detroit, I was amazed by our team’s excellent engineering execution under the extreme pressure of a tough competition,” says Behdinan. “I would like to congratulate all of them for their remarkable achievement.”

April 13, 2015 — Professor Chul Park (MIE) has been named a University of Toronto Distinguished Professor, an honour that recognizes individuals with outstanding career achievements and promise.

Awarded by the U of T Office of the Vice-President and Provost, Park will hold the title of Distinguished Professor of Microcellular Engineered Plastics for a five-year term, beginning July 1, 2015. He will be one of only 20 U of T faculty members, and four Engineering professors, that will actively hold this distinction.

Park is founder and director of the Microcellular Plastics Manufacturing Laboratory(MPML), one of the world’s leading research centres in the refining of plastics foaming technology. Foamed plastics allow manufacturers to create products that can be lighter, more durable and better insulated, but with less raw materials. They’re increasingly used in packaging, upholstery, thermal insulation, building panels, toys and more.

Founded in 2013, the MPML is a commercialization centre for Park’s innovative microcellular technology. He and his team collaborate extensively with partners from the public and private sectors, focusing on  advancing scientific discovery, accelerating technology transfer and training younger engineers.

Park also leads both the Consortium for Cellular and Microcellular Plastics, which currently has about 20 member companies, as well as the NSERC Network for Innovative Plastic Materials and Manufacturing Processes, which involves 20 professors from 11 universities.

“On behalf of the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering, I would like to congratulate Professor Chul Park on this prestigious recognition,” said Jean Zu, chair of MIE. “This honour—one of the highest distinctions U of T can convey —is yet another example of the high level of excellence at MIE.”

Park has an international reputation as a leader in the development of innovative and industrially viable technologies for the manufacture of microcellular foamed plastics that have superior mechanical and insulation properties. He is the author or co-author of over 900 publications, including two books, 240 journal papers and 560 conference papers, and holds 30+ patents.

Technology he developed has been licensed by hundreds of companies, and his research has had a major impact on industry. Most notably, it has allowed various metallic components to be replaced by plastic ones, reducing production and operational costs and allowing for lighter, more fuel-efficient vehicles.

His research also played a major role in replacing environmentally hazardous HCFC-based blowing agents with inert-gas based blowing agents.

Park has received approximately 30 major awards and honours over the course of his career. He is a fellow of three national academies—the Royal Society of Canada, the Canadian Academy of Engineering and the Korean Academy of Science and Technology—as well as the Engineering Institute of Canada, the Society of Plastics Engineers, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering.

April 13, 2015 — MIE Associate Professor Lidan You has been named Fellow by the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering (CSME). The distinction recognizes those who have shown excellence in mechanical engineering and has actively contributed to the progress of their profession and society.

Professor You is the director of Cellular Biomechanics Laboratory at U of T. Her research is focused on solving biomechanical questions in muscular skeletal system at the cellular level. Specifically, her team is working on: the anti-resorptive effect of mechanical loading on bone tissue; pressure effect on bone cell mechanotransduction; osteogenic potential of high frequency low magnitude vibration on bone adaptation; angiogenesis involvement in initiation of bone resorption under disuse condition; the advanced microfluidic system for bone cell mechanotransduction study; the role of focal adhesion assembly in cell mechanosensitivity using micropatterned surface; and, the development of advanced artificial bone matrix by employing novel microfabrication technologies.

April 10, 2015 — Professor Timothy Chan (MIE) has been named the Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Novel Optimization and Analytics in Health.

Ed Holder, Canada’s Minister of State for Science and Technology, shared the news at University of Toronto’s Mississauga campus today, announcing $139 million in nation-wide funding for the CRC program. Chan is among 19 researchers from U of T who received a total of $17.6 million in this round of CRC funding.

Chan is director of the Centre for Healthcare Engineering, where he brings an interdisciplinary, systems engineering approach to improving how health care works both in Canada and abroad. Also an associate professor in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering (MIE), Chan focuses on developing optimization models to help inform better decision-making in the health-care field.

In one area of his research, Chan focuses on how doctors can fine-tune radiation therapies to improve cancer outcomes. Using complex mathematical modeling, he and his team propose treatment strategies that better account for the various uncertainties that present during therapy—such as when the patient breathes during a blast of radiation to a lung or breast tumour.

Chan also develops optimization models for both emergency and pre-hospital medicine. Using  data on historical cardiac arrests, building layouts and current automatic external defibrillators (AEDs) locations, he’s built a computer simulation that recommends the ideal places to put life-saving AEDs.

“I’m really humbled by the CRC appointment and incredibly thankful to the students and postdocs I’ve work with over the years who have contributed to the success of my lab,” said Chan. “The CRC funding will enable me to continue attracting top students to my research group and pushing forward the boundaries of optimization and analytics in health care.”

Internationally, Chan is involved in a collaboration to improve emergency medical care in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Supported by a grant from Grand Challenges Canada, his team is developing models that use GPS data from cell phones to depict how traffic is moving in real time—recommending the best routes for ambulances to an emergency scene.

“We are grateful to the government of Canada for this investment,” said Professor Vivek Goel, U of T’s vice-president, research and innovation. “The CRC program has enabled universities across Canada, U of T among them, to attract and retain the best researchers from around the world. As such, the program is critical to the long-term prosperity of our nation.”

Chan has received an Early Researcher Award from the Ministry of Economic Development and Innovation of Ontario (2012), Early Career Teaching Awards from both MIE (2012) and U of T Engineering (2013), second place in the INFORMS Section on Public Programs, Service and Needs best paper competition (2012) and first place in the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference research paper competition (2013).

Before coming to U of T Engineering, he was an associate in the Chicago office of McKinsey and Company, a global management consulting firm. During that time, he advised leading companies in the fields of medical device technology, travel and hospitality, telecommunications, and energy on issues of strategy, organization, technology and operations.

March 31, 2015 — Professors Kamran Behdinan and Sanjeev Chandra were recently honoured by the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering (CSME), winning the C.N. Downing Award for distinguished service to CSME over many years, and the Jules Stachiewicz Medal for outstanding contributions to heat transfer in Canada, respectively.

Professor Behdinan is the NSERC Chair in Multidisciplinary Engineering Design and the Director of the University of Toronto Institute for Multidisciplinary Design & Innovation (UT-IMDI). He was the President of CSME from 2010 to 2012. His research fields include: design and development of light-weight structures for aerospace, automotive, and nuclear applications, multidisciplinary design optimization of aerospace and automotive systems, as well as multi-scale simulation of nano-structured materials and composites at elevated temperature. He has also published more than 90 peer-reviewed journal papers and 140 conference papers, and six book chapters. He has been the recipient of many prestigious awards and recognitions such as the Research fellow of Pratt & Whitney Canada, fellow of the CSME, and the Ryerson FEAS research awards in 2004 and 2010.

Professor Chandra is known internationally for his research on the dynamics of droplets and sprays. His research spans the areas of combustion, fluid mechanics, heat transfer and materials science and has also been applied in spray coating, spray cooling, fuel combustion and waste heat recovery. He has published more than 200 papers in referred journals and international conference proceedings. In 2010, he was awarded NSERC’s The Brockhouse Canada Prize for Interdisciplinary Research for his outstanding collaborative research. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

“On behalf of the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering, I would like to congratulate Professor Behdinan and Chandra on their prestigious awards,” said Jean Zu, MIE Chair. “Their recognition by CSME is a testament to the extraordinary contributions our faculty continues to make in the field of mechanical engineering.”

CSME award recipients will be honoured at the Congress Banquet on Monday, June 1, 2015, as part of the 2015 Canadian Congress of Applied Mechanics.

March 18, 2015 — Professor David Sinton (MIE) has been named Fellow by the Engineering Institute of Canada (EIC) for his exceptional contributions to bioenergy technologies in Canada.

Sinton is among three U of T engineers honoured. Professors Alberto Leon-Garcia (ECE) and Baher Abdulhai (CivE) were also recognized by EIC for their engineering achievements in the areas of Internet architecture and traffic reduction, respectively.

Sinton has made outstanding research contributions in the area of microfluidics—the science of controlling fluids at a microscopic scale—most notably for energy applications. He has become a globally recognized leader in this area for his pioneering work in pore-scale microfluidics, fluid property analysis, fuel cells and bioenergy. His work has resulted in more than 100 journal publications with over 3,000 citations and numerous research awards, including the CSME I. W. Smith Award, the Douglas R. Colton Award from CMC Microsystems, the Early Career Achievement Award from the University of Toronto Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, and an award for teaching excellence. He is a Fellow of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering (CSME) and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (CSME). He was the 2013 University of Toronto McLean Senior Fellow.

Sinton is the director of the Institute for Sustainable Energy at the University of Toronto. Previous to joining U of T, he was a Canada Research Chair at the University of Victoria and a visiting associate professor at Cornell University.

Read more about EIC’s U of T Engineering honourees.

January 22, 2015 — Tangy the bingo-playing robot will make its debut as part of pilot study at a long-term care facility in Toronto in the coming weeks. Statistics Canada estimates people aged 65 and older will account for almost a quarter of the population by 2051. Prof. Goldie Nejat at the University of Toronto says health-care robots represent the biggest source of funding for her lab from government and industry. Read more.

December 8, 2014 — We may soon be able to enable almost “life-like” mobility in prosthetics, thanks to significant research advances in smart materials at U of T.

Professor Hani Naguib (MIE / MSE) is a renowned engineer whose leading research in the area of smart and multi-functional materials has impacted a range of biomedical and industrial technologies. The joint-appointed faculty member in the departments of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering (MIE) and Materials Science & Engineering (MSE) was recognized for his sustained contributions to the field and inducted as a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) earlier this month.

Dr. Naguib’s work looks at how to enable technologies to adapt and respond to various environments, ranging from applications in artificial muscles to smart textiles. Most recently, he and his colleagues have been developing prosthetic limb actuators and sensors that are built with shape memory materials and electro-active polymers, which may one day allow for persons who require these devices to have almost identical mobility as their biological counterparts. Professor Naguib’s smart materials have also impacted advances in intelligent drug delivery systems, wearable electronics as well as energy storage and harvesting devices.

“The potential of smart materials opens a lot of new doors not only to improve our quality of life, but also to make a mark in our global sustainability efforts. These new polymers, alloys and composites can sense and respond to external stimuli such as temperature or pressure, while making use of green and recycled materials to meet a range of environmental protection and waste management requirements around the world,” said Professor Naguib, whose international recognitions also include fellowships in the United Kingdom’s Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining (IOM3) and in the Canadian Society of Mechanical Engineering.

Founded in 1880, ASME is a not-for-profit organization that enables collaboration, knowledge sharing and skills development across all engineering disciplines. Its 140,000 members are located in over 150 countries and its 600 technical standards addressing safety and efficiency for a range of engineering applications are used in over 100 nations worldwide.

“Congratulations to Hani on this well-deserved recognition. His work has contributed significantly to the field of smart and functional polymeric materials,” said Professor Jun Nogami, Chair of the Department of Materials Science & Engineering. “His work also shows the very close alignment between our Department and the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering.”