Fiona Brinkman

Simon Fraser University

Every day, an unconscious battle takes place between our bodies and our surroundings. A daily barrage of tens of thousands of potentially infectious microbes infiltrates our air, food, water, and our interactions with other people and animals. Our immune system is constantly on duty to protect us. But sometimes our systems can become over-stimulated, leading to inflammation of tissue and even sepsis - a deadly infection of blood or tissue.

Fiona Brinkman is leading a search for answers about what controls this inherent biological system of ours....

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Gino DiLabio

National Institute of Nanotechnology

Big innovations are coming in smaller and smaller packages. Gino DiLabio, with scientists from the National Institute for Nanotechnology (NINT) and the University of Alberta, is modeling organic molecule nanostructures - where one nanometer equals one millionth of a millimeter. No problem seems too small to tackle at the NINT...

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Kumar Nandakumar

University of Alberta

Computational models of fluid flow patterns and behaviours could lead to new innovations in Alberta's oil and gas industry. Kumar Nandakumar is collaborating with fellow University of Alberta Professor Peter Minev to develop next generation algorithms for the direct simulation of multiphase flows using fictitious domain methods. At the heart of their studies is an exploration of problems relating to multiphase flows in industrial situations. These include modeling the tray hydraulics, flow in packed towers, design of structure packings, and erosion/corrosion in pipelines...

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Andrew Calvert

Simon Fraser University

While Canada's west coast earthquakes often maintain the upper hand in sheer force, new research may help remove the quakes' other wildcard _ the element of surprise. To date, there have been few written records of earthquake activity for many faults that may still be active. So, those active faults must be identified by geological mapping or seismic surveys. In that sense, seismologist Andrew Calvert is literally venturing where few have gone before...

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Steven Jones

BC Cancer Research Centre

A key to understanding the complexities behind cancer formation lies in understanding the most basic functions of our living cells. Steven Jones, Head of Bioinformatics in the Genome Sciences Centre at the BC Cancer Research Centre, employs the use of WestGrid supercomputers to piece together some of these puzzles...

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Rachid Ouyed

University of Calgary

A Canadian research collaboration is poised to break new ground in our study of the stars and galaxies. Rachid Ouyed, partnered with Professor Ralph Purdritz, Director of the Origins Institute, McMaster University, plan to use WestGrid resources to support some of the largest simulations recorded of magnetically confined plasma jets. Such simulations will be the first of their kind and put the teams at the forefront of simulations of magnetically confined plasma jets. Perhaps most significantly, these computational simulations will be the first to probe scales observable by the Hubble Space Telescope...

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Rob Simmonds

University of Calgary

As open standards for accessing computer, storage and sensor resources evolve and as implementations of these are more widely deployed, the opportunities for automating much of the end-to-end process of performing computational research increase. An aim is to move away from a world where large amounts of time are taken up determining the location to start a task on a resource, the best way to configure that task on that resource and the best strategies to employ to get a result in an appropriate timescale...

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Tom Ziegler

University of Calgary

Catalytic research, like many other fields of science, is charting a slightly new course these days through its use of computational methodologies and technologies. For the past 25 years, Tom Ziegler's research group has investigated this integration of computation and the art of designing catalysts. His group is developing molecular modeling tools that have the potential to benefit experimental labs around the world...

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Gren Patey

University of British Columbia

Realistic models are offering a glimpse at the molecular choreography behind ion water behaviour in nanopores. Measurements of structure and dynamics offer important clues to understanding and influencing the transport of ions and water through biological channels, carbon nanotubes, inorganic nanotubes, and nanopores of all types.

Such systems have been previously studied, but Gren Patey and his research team's simulations shed new light on the important role density and concentration fluctuations play in these circumstances...

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Peter Visentin

University of Lethbridge

When Peter Visentin attends a violin performance, he appreciates more than just the melody. Visentin's interest lies in using technology to provide quantitative insights into violin performance. For Visentin, research supported by Westgrid funding is an opportunity to employ state-of-the-art movement analysis technology and biomechanical modeling techniques to develop new methods of preventing overuse injuries arising from a musical practice and performance...

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Rod Walker 

Simon Fraser University

WestGrid resources have helped place our country at the forefront of High Energy Physics (HEP) research. Canada currently holds a spot as a major contributor to the international ATLAS collaboration, which explores the fundamental nature of matter and the basic forces that shape the universe around us. Using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) facility in Switzerland, ATLAS researchers, amongst other things, hope to discover the elusive Higgs particle and study its properties...

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Matthew Choptuik

University of British Columbia

Choptuik, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of British Columbia, delves into the components and dynamics of gravitational fields found in space...

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Pierre Boulanger

University of Alberta

The way in which we interact with computers is changing the way science can be done.

Immersed in this revolution is Pierre Boulanger, professor in the Department of Computing Science at the University of Alberta...

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Christopher Hearty

University of British Columbia

The fortune being pursued? Anti-matter – material composed of anti-particles, which are like ordinary protons, electrons and neutrons except they have opposite electrical charges and magnetic movements...

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Michael Ellison

University of Alberta

If DNA and nucleic acids are the building blocks of life, there is a virtual construction zone at work at the University of Alberta...

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