The 2014 Acfas–Jacques-Rousseau award for multidisciplinary work was presented to Sylvain Martel, a professor in Polytechnique Montréal's Department of Computer Engineering. Robots so tiny they can't be seen by the naked eye! It's a theme worthy of science fiction. But we are living it in reality: the reality of nanorobotics, which Professor Martel and his highly multidisciplinary research team has utterly revolutionized. We owe a number of world firsts to this visionary, including the development of a miniscule remote-controlled vehicle set to become part of the chemotherapy arsenal. With this researcher on the case, cancer better watch out!

The originality of Professor Martel's work lies in his combination of multiple types of expertise: medicine, microbiology, fluid dynamics, materials science, nanotechnology, micromechanics, physics, chemistry, microelectronics and computer engineering. This combined approach allows the researcher to come up with ideas never before considered by other teams in the world. He has innovated in several fields, including mechatronics, electronics, cardiology, remote surgery and medical instrumentation. Add to that list computer-controlled bacteria for various applications and the development of implants for machine-brain interfaces.

As the holder of a doctorate in electrical engineering from McGill University in the field of biomedical engineering, Professor Martel began his career at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a postdoctoral fellow and later as a researcher before being hired as a professor at Polytechnique Montréal in 2001. Today he is pursuing his research work at the Nanorobotics Laboratory.

Professor Martel is a pioneer in the use of nanorobotics for medical applications. Among other things, he has developed navigation for microdevices containing therapeutic agents that circulate in the vascular system to directly target cancerous areas for treatment.

For more than 10 years, he has worked in close collaboration with doctors and other specialists including those from the pharmaceutical industry to better target real needs and better tackle thus far insurmountable challenges in the fight against cancer.

He has also contributed to the advancement of knowledge by training high-level researchers in the fields of computer, software and biomedical engineering. He has supervised and co-supervised doctoral and master's work for more than 50 students, and has also helped with the training of postdoctoral researchers and research assistants.

Also recognized by Acfas was Alexandre Bigot, doctoral student in biomedical engineering at Polytechnique. Mr. Bigot is one of the five winners of the 2014 Concours de vulgarisation de la recherche, which awards students who make their research work accessible to the layperson. The presentation was made at the Soirée de la relève en recherche, a celebration for the next generation of young researchers, on September 24. His research project (details in French only) addresses issues in delivering medication to the areas of the human body affected by illness, at the deepest points within an organ. His work consists of developing a medical protocol for using magnets to move medication through various consecutive blood vessels. For this, he uses a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine that can move magnetic microbeads through three-dimensional space; the microbeads are specially equipped and loaded with medication. The goal of his project is to make chemotherapy procedures more effective and more selective by targeting certain affected parts of an organ while preserving the healthy areas nearby. This is multidisciplinary work that requires the researcher to handle issues particular to physics, physiology and pharmacology. 

Our heartiest congratulations to the winners!

See also:
Professor Martel's expertise
Acfas website