2008 ORION Award Winners
The 2008 Awards were presented to outstanding projects, initiatives and leaders in research and education at a cerermony held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre on November 4, 2008. Read all about the initiatives and outstanding individuals recognized this year.
Our 2008 winners:
Ryerson University and CineGrid
Northern Ontario School of Medicine E-Learning Initiatives
Dr. Todd Sands
Winner of the 2008 ORION Discovery Award
Ryerson University and CineGrid
Dr. Paul Hearty (centre), Director of Ryerson University's Rogers Communications Centre and Associate Dean of the Faculty of Communication and Design, with ORION President/CEO Phil Baker (left) and ORION Board Chair Maxim Jean-Louis (right)
Ontario and Canada have claimed a foothold in the future of filmmaking, thanks to Ryerson University and its use of advanced networks and collaboration production technologies, which are about to revolutionize motion picture production and distribution. Ryerson is a founding member of CineGrid, a global consortium of research labs devoted to further development and demonstration of digital cinema technology. The school’s digital cinema team at the Rogers Communications Centre - led by the visionary Dr. Paul Hearty - is helping to establish Ontario and Canada as leaders and hub of expertise in these new technologies. In a successful world-first demonstration of a real-time collaboration over ultra high-speed networks, Ryerson recently utilized a dedicated high-capacity “lightpath” - provided by CANARIE and other networks - to work with partners in Prague and San Diego on the post production of digital motion pictures across the globe.
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Winner of the 2008 ORION Learning Award
Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM) E-Learning Initiatives
Dr. David Topps (centre), Director of E-Learning at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine, with ORION President/CEO Phil Baker (left) and ORION Board Chair Maxim Jean-Louis (right).
The Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM), the first new medical school in Canada in 35 years, is ushering in revolutionary changes in the teaching and training of healthcare professionals. By taking advantage of ORION and collaborative teaching and learning technologies, NOSM is training the next generation of physicians and nurses in a distributed and interactive teaching and learning environment. It has become a recognized leader in e-learning by embracing and deploying innovative multimedia resources and numerous custom-developed interactive applications. NOSM points to a long list of innovative programs, including the use of ORION and its connectivity over CANARIE and California’s CENIC advanced networks, to partner with California’s Stanford School of Medicine to participate in the iAnatomy project. It allows faculty and students to view and manipulate hyper-realistic tissue objects using advanced 3D stereoscopic equipment.
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Winner of the 2008 ORION Leadership Award
Dr. Todd Sands
Dr. Todd Sands (centre), Executive Director and CIO of the Centre for Smart Community Innovation at the University of Windsor, with ORION President/CEO Phil Baker (left) and ORION Board Chair Maxim Jean-Louis (right).
When one thinks of community-based networks in Ontario, it’s hard not to think of Windsor and Dr. Todd Sands. The Executive Director and CIO of Windsor’s Centre for Smart Community Innovation is a recognized pioneer in the development of community-based broadband networks, which have played a critical role in bringing the benefits of advanced technologies and “connectivity” to regional communities. The former chair of the Regional Networks of Ontario is also one of the founders of the ORION network. His efforts have driven the Windsor-Essex region’s smart community successes and shaped the growing recognition that advanced technology and connectivity are critical to economic development and attracting investment in research and innovation across Ontario. Part of his legacy is helping ensure that the benefits of advanced networks and smart community developments are part of the region’s education and economic development agenda and recognized as critical to attracting investment in research and innovation locally.
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Award of Merit Recipients
Winner of the 2008 ORION Discovery Award of Merit
Virtual Researcher on Call (VROC)
From left to right: ORION President/CEO Phil Baker, Kevin Cougler, Douglas Jones, Ron Calhoun, and ORION Board Chair Maxim Jean-Louis.
Hundreds of high school students throughout Ontario have been inspired to consider a career in science or research, as a result of the Virtual Researcher on Call (VROC) and its innovative program. An initiative of Partners in Research, VROC connects high school students with top scientists and experts in university and research institutions through video conferencing over high-speed and advanced networks, including ORION. Based at the University of Western Ontario, the program has so far linked 36 school boards with more than a dozen universities and labs to create virtual “show and tell” presentations. Its goal is to educate students and build interest in the sciences at a critical point in academic development and decision-making. In two short years, VROC has facilitated over 140 virtual sessions, on more than 100 unique and scientific important topics. Plans are now being made to expand the program both regionally and grade category.
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Winners of the 2008 ORION Learning Awards of Merit
Virtual World Design Centre at Loyalist College
Loyalist College, the first Canadian college to build a campus in the virtual world of Second Life, is now sharing its expertise in designing virtual environments with the rest of the world. The Belleville, Ontario college is leveraging the knowledge it gained and best practices it identified in creating its own virtual environment in Second Life to launch a unique and innovative Virtual World Design Centre. The Centre, now at the heart of the virtual environments created for Loyalist College, today contributes to the development of online and virtual environments for several other educational institutions, government organizations and businesses around the world.
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Alice (Experiments) in Wonderland: A Convergent Telematic Performance
Prof. Gerd Hauck (centre), Chair of the Drama and Speech Communications Department at the University of Waterloo, with ORION President/CEO Phil Baker (left) and ORION Board Chair Maxim Jean-Louis (right).
Pioneering a new form of theatre, using a blend of live and virtual elements in real time over advanced networks, researchers, drama faculty and students in Ontario and in the US are introducing a revolutionary way of staging live theatrical performances. Alice (Experiments) in Wonderland – a Convergent Telematic Performance is a cross-border collaboration, where students from the University of Waterloo, the University of Central Florida and Bradley University in Illinois used technology to perform the play together for both local and remote audiences. The live, simultaneous, real-time performance utilized ORION, CANARIE and Internet2 networks to bring together actors from locations hundreds of kilometres apart in the same production. Over 100 faculty, students and staff were involved in the experiment and were able to learn the nuances of staging a live performance in which the actors engaged local audiences as well as remote actors and audiences via multicast and projection screens. The project extended and advanced work done earlier by the same group of collaborators on the classic American play The Adding Machine for which they recently received the prestigious Internet2 IDEA Award.
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Winners of the 2008 ORION Leardership Awards of Merit
Dr. Hussein Mouftah
Dr. Hussein Mouftah (centre), Canada Research Chair in Optical Networks and professor in the School of Information Technology and Engineering at the University of Ottawa, with ORION President/CEO Phil Baker (left) and ORION Board Chair Maxim Jean-Louis (right).
Few people can claim to have contributed to the development of the Internet. Dr. Hussein Mouftah - Canada Research Chair in Optical Networks and professor in the School of Information Technology and Engineering at the University of Ottawa - is one of those people. A world-renowned researcher and instructor who has contributed greatly to the knowledge of advanced networks and telecommunications, Dr. Mouftah’s research has been seminal to the understanding of high-speed and optical networks, switching architectures, wireless cell communications, traffic engineering, quality of service and performance modeling. His work has contributed to the development of the Internet as we know it today. In a career spanning more than 30 years Dr. Mouftah has been instrumental in the furthering of advanced networks, and has been a prolific source of information and teaching for the researchers under his tutelage and network engineers worldwide.
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Robert (Bob) Gagne
Bob Gagne (centre), CIO of York University, with ORION President/CEO Phil Baker (left) and ORION Board Chair Maxim Jean-Louis (right).
Bob Gagne, CIO at York University has been instrumental in helping the university provide the advanced and collaborative information technology platform that has helped York University establish its status as a world-class research institution. Through his vision and leadership, Gagne has helped further the communication and research capabilities of the Greater Toronto Area and further advance Canada’s innovation agenda. He played a critical role in the creation of the ORION network and helped coordinate the establishment of a critical ORION Point of Presence (PoP) at York. As a co-founder and chair of GTAnet, Gagne provided the necessary leadership and support that helped ensure the participation of several critical research and postsecondary institutions in the GTA to take advantage of ORION to advance their research and education capabilities.
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