Engineering Practical Solutions to Protect Our Environment and Our Communities

Dr. Sam Salem from the Department of Civil Engineering and Dr. Seung-Il Lee from the Faculty of Natural Resources Management have received Discovery Grants from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) to develop innovative solutions to critical engineering and environmental issues. Theirs are among 15 Lakehead University projects receiving a total of over $2.7 million in funding from NSERC.

“Lakehead researchers are at the forefront of tackling the urgent challenges facing our region, from escalating wildfires to the broader impacts of climate change,” Vice-President, Research and Innovation Dr. Langis Roy says. “This vital NSERC funding will lead to practical solutions that will protect both our environment and our communities while training the next generation of scientists and engineers.”

Setting a Global Standard for Mass Timber Fire Safety

Building on over a decade of cutting-edge research at the Lakehead University Fire Testing and Research Laboratory (LUFTRL), which he founded, Dr. Salem and his research team are improving the safe and widespread use of engineered wood products— called mass timber— in construction.

Despite mass timber’s growing popularity as a sustainable alternative to steel and concrete, the construction industry lacks proven standards for inspecting, assessing, and repairing these buildings after a fire.

Various full-size mass timber building elements, such as beams, columns, and slabs, will be put through intense fire testing. The burned materials will then be analyzed and assessed to determine exactly how fire affects them using rigorous char-layer analysis before applying innovative repair and retrofitting techniques. The outcomes of this research program will help the construction industry accurately assess structural safety after a fire and choose the most reliable, cost-effective ways to repair or rebuild.

“This research will improve public safety, influence building codes, and support the sustainable use of mass timber in high-rise constructions,” says Dr. Salem, the 2026 recipient of the Distinguished Researcher Award for his contributions to structural fire engineering.

This practical research program positions LUFTRL as a global leader in structural fire engineering, shaping best practices and standards for the mass timber industry in Canada and beyond.

Protecting Creepy-Crawlers in Northwestern Ontario’s Forests

Land-dwelling arthropods (insects, spiders, and other “creepy-crawlers”) make up nearly 70% of all forest species. Highly sensitive to their environment, they serve as an early-warning system for forests facing climate change and industrial logging.

Three student-led projects under the supervision of Dr. Lee will foster sustainable ecosystem management and the conservation of arthropods in northwestern Ontario’s forests.

The first student-led project investigates how jack pine logging affects forest biodiversity. Researchers will determine how much wood debris loggers need to leave behind on the forest floor to allow ground-dwelling and wood-dependent insects to recover from the impacts of logging.

Study two will provide northwestern Ontario with its first in-depth assessment of regional insect biodiversity. The project examines how different levels of commercial thinning in black spruce forests affect local spider and insect populations.

Using mesh screens to block insects from specific wood samples, the third research team will determine whether insects or microbes— like fungi and bacteria— do the heavy lifting of breaking down dead wood in managed versus wild forests.

“Together, these projects will provide valuable insights to enhance the management and conservation of Canada’s forest ecosystems and biodiversity,” Dr. Lee says.

In 2025-26, Lakehead University received $2.8 million in assistance from the Research Support Fund to support the indirect costs of research, which include costs for supporting the management of intellectual property, research and administration, ethics and regulatory compliance, research resources, research facilities, and research security.

Funding Recipients

Lakehead University received a total of $2,702,000 from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). The following Lakehead researchers have received grants:

Discovery Grants (five-year grants)

Dr. Abedalrhman Alkhateeb, Department of Computer Science, "Self-aligned, Causal, and Actionable Multimodal AI Framework for Complex Biomedical Data", $192,500.

Dr. Liang Cui, Department of Civil Engineering, "Multiaxial Mechanical Behavior of Exposed Cemented Paste Backfill under Multiphysics Curing Conditions", $215,000.

Dr. Gautam Das, Department of Physics, "Investigation into photonic devices and their applications in sensing trace chemicals and gases", $180,000.

Dr. Peter Hollings, Department of Geology, "Magmatic evolution and mineralization of the Midcontinent Rift, Ontario", $200,000.

Dr. Seung-Il Lee, Faculty of Natural Resources Management, "Linking forest management intensity to arthropod biodiversity recovery and ecosystem function", $222,500.

Dr. Osama (Sam) Salem, Department of Civil Engineering, "Innovative Techniques for Post-Fire Assessment and Structural Rehabilitation of Mass Timber Buildings", $215,000.

Dr. Tobias Stephan, Department of Geology, "Kinematics and Strain Geometry of Archean Tectonics – A New Tool for Predicting Gold Mineralization in the Canadian Shield", $187,500.

Dr. Abdelhamid Tayebi, Department of Electrical Engineering, "Towards Fully Autonomous Navigation: Robust Estimation and Control Strategies", $260,000.

Dr. Wilson Quansheng Wang, Department of Mechanical Engineering, "Intelligent Diagnostics and Prognostics of EV Drive Systems", $235,000.

Dr. Qiang Wei, Department of Electrical Engineering, "Power Converter Topologies and Controls for High-Power Medium-Voltage Battery Energy Storage Systems", $235,000.

Dr. Kaiyu Wu, Department of Computer Science, "Space Efficient Graph Data Structures", $192,500.

Dr. Yushi Zhou, Department of Electrical Engineering, "Scalable On-Chip Low-Dropout Regulators Architectures for Edge Artificial Intelligence System on Chips", $235,000.

Discovery Development Grants (two-year grant)

Dr. Jinqiang Hou, Department of Chemistry, "Integrated Chemical-Digital Technologies for Targeted Molecular Probes in Biological Regulation and Imaging", $44,000.

Dr. Eltayeb Mohamedelhassan, Department of Civil Engineering, "Solar-electrokinetic in-situ leaching for sustainable critical minerals extraction", $44,000.

Dr. Douglas Morris, Department of Biology, "Evolutionary ecology of habitat selection", $44,000.