CFI awards Lassonde researchers more than $3 million

Lassonde School of Engineering researchers has received a total of over $3-million in infrastructure funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) to support their research projects.

Michael Daly, York Research Chair in Planetary Science and associate professor in the Department of Earth and Space Science and Engineering (ESSE), Lassonde School of Engineering and the team he leads will receive more than $1.3 million in funding to build a Canadian Planetary Simulator (CAPS) facility. 

The Canadian Planetary Simulator will allow the simulation and investigation of extreme terrestrial and other planetary environments as well as the development and testing of instruments suited to these environments. The simulator is the only one of its kind known – a combination of capable integrated instruments with a capable environmental simulator.

It will allow Canadian universities to lead high-profile research in planetary and instrument science and provide Canadian companies with competitive advantages in the development of instrumentation. Daly will lead a team of scientists from York University, as well as collaborators from eight companies and 10 other universities on the project.

Tom McElroy, NSERC/ABB/CSA industrial research chair in Atmospheric Remote Sounding, in the Department of Earth and Space Science and Engineering (ESSE), Lassonde School of Engineering and Regina Lee, Chair of ESSE, and the team they lead will receive more than $1.68 million in funding to establish a state-of-the-art research facility for designing, building, characterizing and operating instruments and payloads for suborbital missions.

The facility will support end-to-end mission development for cost-effective, orbital and sub-orbital platforms: nanosatellites, sub-orbital rockets, high-altitude balloons and airplanes. The facility will comprise: (1) a micro-fabrication laboratory optimized for the production of Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) payloads; (2) a payload calibration and flight test-bed for the purposes of systems integration and space-qualification; and (3) a mission operations centre for real-time data analysis, satellite tracking and communications.

Professor McElroy is the Principal Investigator of the project and Lee is the Deputy Principal Investigator.  Together, they will lead a team of scientists from York University and four other Universities across Canada on the project.