News

It is our great pleasure to announce that Dr. Baidya Saha, Assistant professor in our Faculty of Science, has been awarded an NSERC Discovery Grant in 2020. This is Concordia University of Edmonton’s second NSERC DG, and is the second year in a row that a member of CUE’s faculty has succeeded in this program.

Dr. Saha’s research, “A unifying framework for integrating domain knowledge into machine learning algorithms for multidisciplinary industrial applications” was granted support through the funding announced by the Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry. The announcement was made along with Dr. Alejandro Adem, President of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

Dr. Baidya Saha, NSERC Discovery Grant 2020 recipient

Dr. Saha’s research proposes that “over the next five years, we plan to work on developing a novel unifying framework for utilizing human advice in an efficient manner to facilitate machine learning (ML) algorithms and we intend to develop novel solutions to human-guided learning for industrial applications. The long-term goals of the proposed research include deep investigation and development of novel, automated, efficient real-time
ML algorithms capable of providing solutions to industrial problems by exploiting domain knowledge in both supervised and unsupervised methods.”

The program by Dr. Saha has the “…potential to significantly impact:

1. industrial applications in fields such as medical imaging and forensics;
2. the welding industry;
3. the manufacturing industry; and,
4. the robotics industry.”

What does this award mean for CUE?

“We are quite pleased to learn that Baidya has been succesful in this competition. Research at CUE, in particular in the field of Mathematics and Information Technologies, is growing and receiving increasing recognition as leaders in the field”, said Dr. Ramses Ilarraza, CUE’s Asst. Vice-President Research.

“This is the second year in a row that a CUE investigator receives an award in this important stream. The contributions to CUE’s research by our faculty members are key to further the implementation of our Strategic Research Plan 2019-2024, and point us in the right direction. We are thankful to NSERC for the continued support to Early Career Researchers as Baidya and Ha Tran, who are in the process of developing their research programs. In addition, these successes also open the doors to students to participate in exciting research at CUE.”

What is the Discovery Grant Program?

Discovery Grants are the most important awards to investigators provided by NSERC. These awards fund the programs of Canadian researchers, with particular support for Early Career Researchers, under the scope of NSERC;s Subject Matter.

The Discovery Grant award is an individual, five-year award of operating funds. Along with this, Dr. Saha will also receive a one-time Discovery Launch Supplement. This recent NSERC initiative is awarded to Early Career Researchers within the first year of their Discovery Grants. NSERC has made their support to investigators at this stage clear, as they are actively supporting them to bring a diversity of new voices and new insights to their fields.

Research Support Fund

Research at Concordia University of Edmonton is also supported by the Research Support Fund, a Tri-Agency initiative that assists Canadian post-secondary institutions with costs associated with managing research funded by the federal research granting agencies. Concordia University of Edmonton acknowledges the value of this support and appreciates this ongoing research investment.