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The CCEC 2020 technical program.

Plenary Overview

Sunday, October 25 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM Student Welcome & Keynote
Monday, October 26 10:50 AM - 11:50 AM The climate emergency: What can we do?
Tuesday, October 27 10:50 AM - 11:50 AM Growth of bioprocessing technologies for clean sustainable energy production
Wednesday, October 28 10:55 AM - 11:55 AM Building effective EDI practices: A panel discussion with changemakers
Thursday, October 29 10:50 AM - 11:50 AM Emerging Leaders in Chemical Engineering

Student Welcome & Keynote

Sunday, October 25, 11:00 AM-12:00 PM

Sonya Shorey

Vice President of Strategy, Marketing and Communications for Invest Ottawa and Bayview Yards

Sonya Shorey, Vice President of Strategy, Marketing and Communications for Invest Ottawa and Bayview Yards, is an executive and management consultant with more than 20 years of leadership experience with private and public organizations. Since 2005, Sonya has led, strategized, authored and/or made a significant contribution to successful multi-year funding proposals and initiatives valued at more than $185 million from municipal, provincial, federal and international governments. This includes Area X.O, the futureplex of innovation and collaboration; and the first Pan-Ontario Scale-Up Platform of its kind aimed at accelerating the scaleup and success of more $100 million tech firms in Canada. She also architected and leads Invest Ottawa’s Female Founder and Womxn-Owned Business Strategy, and International Womxn’s Week.

In this keynote, Sonya will be sharing her experiences and expertise on how to get started as an entrepreneur and as a young professional. Her valuable insights will help equip young professionals with the skills and ideas needed to succeed in an interdisciplinary field. The keynote will start off with a 15-minute talk from Sonya followed by a fireside chat, where attendees can ask any questions.

Plenary Session

Monday, October 26, 10:50 AM-11:50 AM

The climate emergency: What can we do?

Michel Dumoulin​

VP Engineering, National Research Council Canada (NRC)

Michel Dumoulin earned a BSc and MSc in chemistry at Université de Montréal, followed by a PhD in chemical engineering at École Polytechnique in Montreal, specializing in polymer rheology and processing.

He has extensive experience in the polymer materials industry, as a research scientist with DuPont Canada Research Centre in Kingston (Ontario, Canada), with Imperial Chemicals Industry in Brussels, Belgium, and as R&D Director of ADS Composites in Quebec City.

He was with NRC’s Industrial Materials Institute for over 25 years, as a research scientist, research group leader and finally as Director, Advanced Materials Design, leading R&D activities in advanced polymers, composites, metals, and ceramics as well as nanomaterials. Dr. Dumoulin went on to be named Executive Director for the Industrial Biomaterials Flagship Program, and then Director General of the NRC’s Automotive and Surface Transportation Research Centre, where he led major initiatives into advanced manufacturing, lightweighting of vehicles through composites and aluminium technology, electrification of transportation and intelligent transportation systems.

He has co-authored over 130 scientific publications and 5 patents. He has played key roles in creating several multi-partner R&D initiatives in advanced materials and manufacturing, providing NRC’s leading-edge technology to numerous clients and partners.

Dr. Dumoulin has been involved in numerous professional activities and particularly at the executive level in the Canadian Society of Rheology and Society of Plastics Engineers. He has chaired or played instrumental roles in several leading conferences and symposia such as the International Congress of Rheology and the Polymer Processing Society’s International Meeting. He is a member of the Board of the International Council for Research and Innovation in Building and Construction.

Plenary Session

Tuesday, October 27, 10:50 AM-11:50 AM

Growth of bioprocessing technologies for clean sustainable energy production

Ajai Dalai, FCIC

University of Saskatchewan
2020 R. S. Jane Award Winner

Ajay Dalai is the Canada Research Chair in Bioenergy and Environmentally Chemical Processing and a leading international expert on renewable energy, heavy oil and gas processing, and catalytic reaction engineering. His innovative research has resulted in numerous international publications and many patents for processes and catalysts he has developed, which have had significant impact on the Canadian petroleum and bioenergy industry. Professor Dalai is a Fulbright Fellow, a Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, a Fellow of the Chemical Institute of Canada (CIC), a Fellow of the Engineering Institute of Canada, a Fellow of the Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers, and more recently the 2014 CIC Bantrel Award in Design and Industrial Practice winner.

EDI Plenary Panel Discussion

Wednesday, October 28, 10:55 AM-11:55 AM

Building effective EDI practices: A panel discussion with changemakers

Geneviève Tanguay

Moderator
Vice-President, Emerging Technologies at the National Research Council Canada (NRC)

Catherine Mavriplis

Panelist
Professor, University of Ottawa and NSERC Chair for Women in Science and Engineering

Denise Pothier

Panelist
Stantec, Vice President, Practice Services and Vice President, Indigenous Relations

Paulette Vincent Ruz

Panelist
Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Michigan

Emerging Leaders in Chemical Engineering

Thursday, October 29, 10:50 AM-11:50 AM

This prestigious plenary session showcases the personal perspectives of three leading early-career researchers in 10-minute TED Talk-style presentations. The panelists will highlight their vision of opportunities and big challenges in their respective fields, discuss strategies for success, and offer their views on where research is moving in the next 5 to 10 years. 

Beyond lithium-ion batteries: Development of next-generation aluminum ion batteries with superior performance

Gisele Azimi, MCIC

University of Toronto

Gisele Azimi is an Associate Professor and Canada Research Chair joint-appointed between the Departments of Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry and Materials Science & Engineering at the University of Toronto. She established the Laboratory for Strategic Materials in 2014, conducting research on addressing sustainability challenges in terms of energy, environment, and critical materials. She has received several prestigious awards and has delivered 25 invited talks in renowned national and international conferences and universities including MIT. She is on the editorial board of the Canadian Journal of Chemical Engineering and Scientific Reports and she is the lead organizer of Rare Metal Symposia in renowned national and international conferences including COM and TMS. Not only is she pushing the limits of science and technology in her field, she does so in collaboration with 11 top-ranked industrial sponsors, who understand and benefit from her unique approach to solving real world problems. She has published over 40 journal articles with more than 1500 citations. She also has 15 patent applications with two patents granted. She has grown her research group to 18 sole-supervised members in different capacities – undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and research associates. She has graduated 11 Postdoc/PhD/MASc students, 7 placed in the Canadian industry and academia.

Deriving Functional Devices from Nature

Noémie-Manuelle Dorval Courchesne

Noémie-Manuelle Dorval Courchesne

McGill University

Noémie-Manuelle Dorval Courchesne is an Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering at McGill University since 2017. She was trained as a multidisciplinary scientist and engineer and earned a double degree in Biotechnology (Chemical Engineering & Biochemistry) from the University of Ottawa in 2010. She then obtained her PhD in Chemical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2015, and worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard until 2017. In her research, she integrates synthetic biology with scalable assembly processes, to fabricate sustainable functional materials. She has worked in the field of bio-derived and bio-inspired materials for a decade, focusing on the fabrication and characterization of novel functional materials and devices using self-assembling recombinant proteins. Prof. Dorval Courchesne is actively involved in industrially-relevant research, with the goal of introducing biologically-derived technologies in real-world products. She is a member of several research networks including the Quebec Center for Advanced Materials (QCAM), the Research Center for High Performance Polymer and Composite Systems (CREPEC), the Trottier Institute for Sustainability in Engineering and Design (TISED) and the McGill Sustainability Systems Initiative (MSSI). In 2020, she was recognized for her research potential as the recipient of the Christopher Pierre Award for Research Excellence (Early Career) at McGill.

When liquids act like solids and solids like liquids

Kevin Golovin

The University of British Columbia

Prof. Kevin Golovin is an Assistant Professor at the University of British Columbia Okanagan in the School of Engineering. Golovin holds degrees in material science and engineering from Cornell University (B.S.) and the University of Michigan (Ph.D.). Golovin is the Principal Investigator of the Okanagan Polymer Engineering Research & Applications (OPERA) Lab, which investigates interfacial mechanics, coatings, surface modification, and sustainable methods for achieving solid and liquid repellency. The OPERA lab explores both fundamental and applied projects, with industry partners including Arc’teryx, Boeing, FPInnovations, and PRE Labs. Golovin also leads the Comfort Optimized Materials For Operational Resilience, Thermal-transport, and Survivability (COMFORTS) Micro-net, a large-scale, interdisciplinary network sponsored by DND, investigating improved soldier protection and comfort. He additionally leads the UBC Cluster of Excellence in Comfort, a textile-centric collaborative group investigating novel, comfort-enabling technologies.

Before being recruited to the University of British Columbia, Golovin served as Vice President of Technology for HygraTek, a coatings/paints start-up based out of Ann Arbor, MI. At HygraTek, Golovin oversaw the development of novel coatings solutions including anti-icing materials for heat exchangers, dust-repellent coatings for vacuum cleaners, and omniphobic fabrics for the US Navy. Golovin is an inventor on 7 patents, one of which is actively licensed. Golovin has received various accolades, including the ProQuest Distinguished Dissertation Award and the Patagonia Eco Innovation Case Competition Grand Prize.