On May 18th and 19th if you were one of the 2,600 attendees at the Discovery, Ontario Centres of Excellence 11 Tradeshow at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre you may have come across the Bio.Diaspora project one of the more than 330 exhibitors at the tradeshow. Bio.Diaspora is a scientific project dedicated to understanding how the world's population interacts through the global movement of travelers.
Discovery is Canada's leading innovation to commercialization tradeshow hosted by the Ontario Centres of Excellence (OCE). The tradeshow brings together key players from industry, academia, government and the investment community. Discovery is an excellent networking opportunity, start-ups and entrepreneurs can meet with investors and venture capitalists, government funders and representatives from the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade. This year, Discovery provided a look into the hottest Canadian mobile trends, apps, tablets and what's driving new Canadian developers to build mobile-focused start-ups, while panelists spoke on mobile trends, funding and innovation. Long time innovation supporter, Ontario Minister of Research and Innovation Glen Murray was present at the Discovery tradeshow.
"Discovery is the kind of event that showcases what we do so well in Ontario, connecting innovators with the expertise and resources they need to thrive. Ontario is one of the few innovation centres in the world, we are laying the groundwork for quality jobs, world-class exports and the competitive edge that will ensure we thrive and prosper now and in the future." -Ontario Minister of Research and Innovation Glen Murray.
The Bio.Diaspora system was developed by a team at St.Michael's Hospital led by Dr. Kamran Khan, in collaboration with partners at Ryerson University and the Harvard Medical School. The Bio.Diaspora architecture employs three key software solutions: ESRI's ArcGIS technology, which provides powerful visualization through a range of web maps, SAS business analytics software which integrated and managed data and MATLAB technical computing software, used for data analysis and numeric computation. The system helps protect the health of the entire global community allowing countries to detect and prevent disease outbreaks before they even reach an airport. The Bio.Diaspora system can help enhance emergency preparedness during large scale international events and mass gatherings. The Bio.Diaspora system was used to accurately predict how the H1N1 virus would spread worldwide after arising in Mexico in early 2009 and it has also been used to assess global infectious disease threats during the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games and the World Cup. The system is currently being leveraged to enhance health planning for the coming 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London, England.
The Bio.Diaspora Project by St. Michael's can be found online at www.biodiaspora.com
On April 28 St. Michael's Hospital was selected as a 2011 Laureate winner for innovation by the International Data Group's (IDG) Computerworld Honors Program and was presented with the award at the Annual Laureates Medal Ceremony & Gala Awards on June 20, 2011 at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium in Washington, D.C. The award program honours visionary applications of information technology promoting positive social, economic and educational change and is the longest running program to honour those individuals and organizations that use IT in such a way. The Computerworld Honors Program is governed by the not-for-profit Computerworld Information Technology Awards Foundation and was founded by International Data Group in 1988. The project by St. Michaels Hospital was was selected from over 1,000 international entries in this year's Laureates program. As a Laureate winner, the Bio.Diaspora case study will become part of the Honors International Program Archive, available to researchers, students and scholars through cwhonors.org and digital records housed in national archives in over 350 universities, museums and research institutions worldwide.
Conference Alert:
Transforming Health & Economics: 8th World Congress on Health Economics is being held at the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel, located in the heart of Toronto across from Nathan Phillips Square and Toronto City Hall July 10 to 13th 2011.
www.healtheconomics.org/congress/2011
The International Health Economics Association will be working in partnership with the Global TV production company WebsEdge to produce special editions of IHEA TV at the 8th Annual World Congress.
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