by Prof. Pascal Fallavollita, Ottawa, Canada
METRICS was established at the end of 2016 after I accepted an academic position at the Interdisciplinary School of Health Sciences, University of Ottawa. The laboratory is located at the Lees Campus of the University and provides an interdisciplinary platform for both Health Sciences and Engineering students. A strong collaboration between clinicians, rehabilitation therapists, and our community partners has been setup to catalyze various fundamental and translational research activities. Currently, the main areas of research include:
- Medical education & residency training
- Surgical workflows & computer-assisted interventions
- Aspiration – not rehabilitation (fostering healthy ageing)
These three research areas explore the impact of novel mixed-reality technologies and how these should be integrated to ensure the development and sustainment of a clinician’s professional career across a lifespan while ensuring positive patient outcomes and fostering healthy habits for older adults.
Over the next several years two key funded projects have begun in the METRICS laboratory. First, I am the recipient of an Early Researcher Award for my work in 3D Interventional Augmented Reality. This award seeks to open a new research front by transforming the orthopedic and trauma surgery rooms of tomorrow via the optimization of surgical workflow which consequently will reduce both surgical time and radiation exposure. Second, I am the recipient of a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Discovery grant for my work in Personalized Perception and Interaction in Mixed Reality Environments. This award seeks to open new technological developments leading to the design and running of collaborative mixed-reality. This provides extensible and versatile solutions to different problems in distinct scenarios, e.g., such as in in the area of telerehabilitation.
Readers are invited to visit the Metrics Lab website to get more information on aspects of our work. We are actively seeking excellent interns, graduates students, and Postdocs to help reach our research objectives.