Lassonde professor receives $1.65 million funding for Data Analytics and Visualization Program

James Elder, Professor in the Lassonde School of Engineering and the Faculty of Health’s Department of Psychology, and a member of York University’s Centre for Vision Research, has received $1.65 million over six years from Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) Collaborative Research and Training Experience (CREATE) grants program.

He will lead a program in Data Analytics and Visualization providing interdisciplinary training in both computational analytics and perceptual design methodologies for deriving value from big data for a broad range of industrial applications.

Data analytics and visualization (DAV) addresses the wealth of diverse forms of data produced by a myriad of instruments and systems, including (i) Physical infrastructures like sensor networks, power grids, wireless communication systems, and transportation networks; (ii) Social and economic networks and; (iii) Healthcare systems like immunization and epidemiology networks, and molecular and gene regulatory networks.

The program is a multi-institution, a multi-sector collaboration between York University (the lead institution), OCAD University, Concordia University and the University of Toronto, together with a number of leading Canadian high-tech companies in Toronto and Montreal, focused on applications in cloud computing, digital cultures, health technology and smart cities.

Graduates of the program will go on to take permanent positions in industry, universities and government, and will be Canadian leaders in the field of Data Analytics and Visualization in a broad range of application areas.

The Data Analytics and Visualization team includes 10 researchers at four Canadian universities, as well as ten other academic collaborators and fourteen non-academic partner organizations. The program will contribute to the training of 56 students and post-doctoral fellows over 6 years.