A doctoral citation summarizes the nature of the independent research, provides a high-level overview of the study, states the significance of the work and says who will benefit from the findings in clear, non-specialized language, so that members of a lay audience will understand it.
| Year | Citation | Program |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Dr. Adams explored how human mutations that cause migraine headaches alter the function of proteins in the brain. The work has provided greater understanding of how communication between neurons is disrupted during migraine. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Dietrich's thesis focused on the synthesis of modified short proteins similar to the mushroom toxin amanitin. These molecules were tested for their effect on RNA synthesis within living cells. They can be used to improve our understanding of how the production of RNA is inhibited. | Doctor of Philosophy in Chemistry (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Xu developed a novel reactor used for carbon dioxide separation and investigated the reactor operation and performance through experiments and a mathematical model. This research provides an important method to reduce the carbon dioxide emission. | Doctor of Philosophy in Chemical and Biological Engineering (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Kalra suggests that by evaluating multiple endpoints to assess the therapeutic effects of targeted drugs in vitro and in vivo, we can better predict their performance in clinical trials. These studies showed that molecular targeting strategies involving a protein called Integrin Linked Kinase could be beneficial in the treatment of breast cancers. | Doctor of Philosophy in Pathology and Laboratory Medicine (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Schmidt developed fast new methods for learning the statistical relationships between a large numbers of variables. Such techniques are useful for processing many different kinds of data. | Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Science (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Bu's work addresses privacy concerns in data mining. His new methods will allow dataset owners to employ outside data-mining service providers to do useful analysis on a database, without ever having access to the private information the database contains. | Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Science (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Yeung showed that making articulatory movements with one's lips, tongue, and jaw influences the perception of speech in adults, as well as in 4-month-old infants. This work shows that speech production is closely related to speech perception from early in development, even before infants begin producing clear speech themselves. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Blackwell examined the link between various emotional styles and biological health in young women. She found that negative emotions predicted less optimal metabolic symptoms, whereas positive emotions were unrelated to these outcomes. This research suggests that interventions aimed at decreasing negative affect may reduce future risk for disease. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Sorsdahl studied the family, social, psychological and physical health factors that affect the re-entry and transition experience of CF military members returning from overseas deployments. Through this study, Dr. Sorsdahl intends to propose changes to the current Canadian military support systems in place for returning military members. | Doctor of Philosophy in Counselling Psychology (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Juarez Garcia's research makes two major contributions to an interdependency simulator (I2Sim) to handle different types of hazards and events that affect dense concentrations of people. With the methodology and I2Sim it will be possible to build up Regional models, Disaster Scenarios, Objective Functions and Emergency Planning. | Doctor of Philosophy in Civil Engineering (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Sajedi studied the effects of excessive soil moisture on processes involved with carbon and nitrogen mineralization, plant species distribution and forest productivity. In her research, she also assessed the impact of clearcutting and drainage on site productivity and soil carbon storage as potential management strategies in wet forest ecosystems. | Doctor of Philosophy in Forestry (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Cheng examined the structure-function relationship of cationic antimicrobial peptides and lipopeptides. These studies help in understanding how these peptides might be developed as novel antibiotics, and as possible solutions to the problem of fast-growing antibiotic resistance. | Doctor of Philosophy in Chemistry (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Hanson studied the effects of childhood environment on biological responses to stress in adulthood. She found that individuals from more difficult childhood environments had greater biological responses to daily stressors, including greater cortisol secretion and sleep disturbances. Over time, these increased stress responses may make them more susceptible to disease. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Dalrymple examined how the human brain creates an individual?s representation of the visual world by studying patients with brain injury who can only see one object at a time. Her work supports the theory that the perception of space is imperative to visually defining the objects that we see. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Wen developed a potential solution for ultrasound-based dose computation for a type of radiation treatment of prostate cancer. He helped build a functional prototype imaging system that makes it possible to test the proposed method in the lab or clinically. | Doctor of Philosophy in Electrical and Computer Engineering (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Syyong showed that intracellular calcium oscillations dynamically control regional blood flow in the brains of the young and healthy. He discovered that loss of these calcium oscillations and their compensation by slower enzyme-based signaling is associated with vascular disease and possibly aging, thus explaining loss of function. | Doctor of Philosophy in Pharmacology (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Davis's doctoral studies contributed to a better understanding of how best to prevent falls in a cost-effective manner. She found that twice weekly resistance training significantly improved health related quality of life while reducing health care costs compared with balance and toning classes among older adults at risk of falls. | Doctor of Philosophy in Experimental Medicine (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Waldbillig's research focuses on making clean energy affordable. He developed a novel manufacturing process to fabricate high-performing solid oxide fuel cell electrolyte layers rapidly and inexpensively. He subsequently used this process to produce working fuel cells with optimized electrolyte layers and then characterized their properties. | Doctor of Philosophy in Materials Engineering (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Liu studied the growth of neurons in the developing brain. Using techniques to label and genetically modify individual neurons he showed that their growth and maturation is regulated by the same molecular pathway regulating memory maintenance as in the adult brain. His work illuminates a mechanism underlying developmental plasticity and provides new insights on origins of developmental neurological disorders. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Boothe's research asks why Canada is the only advanced welfare state that lacks nation-wide pharmaceutical insurance, despite its universal hospital and medical programs. She finds that the key is incrementalism, as approaching policy development in stages makes it less likely that a full range of services will be adopted. | Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Oppong challenges the view that effective economic integration in Africa is hindered by purely socio-economic, political and infrastructural problems. He argues that radical reforms to community and national laws are needed to bring about the economic integration agenda that is essential for Africa's long-term economic growth. | Doctor of Philosophy in Law (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Chan examined the enabling mechanisms for optimizing lean, spark-ignition for natural gas engines. His research demonstrated stable ultra-lean combustion using a novel spark-ignition strategy. | Doctor of Philosophy in Mechanical Engineering (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Barakauskas measured several presynaptic proteins in brain samples, developing and validating new methods to do so. Some of these proteins were altered in distinct regions of the striatum in post-mortem brain samples of subjects with schizophrenia. These findings implicate these proteins in brain dysfunction in patients. | Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Gallo identified new roles for a metabolic gene in maintaining the structure of mitochondria and controlling programmed cell death, insulin secretion and germline stem cell proliferation. His studies produced new insight into how some mitochondrial proteins are able to integrate metabolic and cell survival signals with implications for the treatment of metabolic diseases. | Doctor of Philosophy in Medical Genetics (PhD) |
| 2010 | Dr. Shoa investigated an artificial muscle actuator device and characterized and modeled its physical properties. She studied the feasibility of using this device for guiding a catheter through arteries. | Doctor of Philosophy in Electrical and Computer Engineering (PhD) |