TMU students present leading-edge SRC projects at 2026 Undergraduate Research Opportunities Showcase

The 2026 Undergraduate Research Opportunities (URO) Showcase, held on September 17 in the Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) Student Learning Centre, featured more than 55 student research projects from six faculties. The showcase helped students build key presentation and knowledge-translation skills as they presented their scholarly, research and creative (SRC) URO summer projects to students and faculty from across the university.

Student projects covered a wide range of research topics, from creating new construction materials that reduce waste and improving quantum software testing to developing robotic hands for remote surgery and examining the effects of math anxiety on siblings.

“Today’s event is a wonderful opportunity to come together to showcase the excellence of our undergraduate researchers and discuss their ideas and diverse projects,” said Steven N. Liss, TMU’s vice-president, research and innovation, during his opening remarks. “Each poster you see represents not just countless hours of effort, but also the insights and discoveries that contribute to our SRC enterprise.” 

Dean of Libraries Mark Robertson praised the participating students for their efforts in contributing knowledge. “Research is about community,” he said. “It’s about participating in an ongoing scholarly conversation, challenging received ideas, building on the work of others and, most importantly, communicating your own findings.”

Since 2019, the Office of the Vice-President, Research and Innovation (OVPRI) has funded the annual, faculty-based, competitive URO program. The 14-week summer program includes poster presentation workshops led by TMU Libraries on key knowledge translation skills and culminates with the URO Showcase. For the third consecutive year, OVPRI funded five TMU students to participate in a program hosted by William Osler Health System, focused on health-related work. Applications for the next URO will open early in 2027.

Learn more about the URO program.

URO Showcase select projects

Sibling Effects of Math Anxiety on Adolescent Achievement

Mariana Zapounidis, who recently finished her undergraduate degree in psychology, worked with psychology professor Ryan Persram to study whether math anxiety is shared between siblings. 

Zapounidis asked 76 young teens, all of whom had a sibling within three years of their own age, to rate their math anxiety level on a scale of one to five. Next, the test subjects tried to complete 14 complex arithmetic problems in three minutes, with the goal of measuring math achievement. In the final step, designed to measure math fluency, the teens had three minutes to solve 160 simple questions.

Surprisingly, the results showed that younger siblings who reported math anxiety were likely to perform better at answering the complex arithmetic questions than those who reported lower levels of math anxiety.

“I want to do work that picks this apart even more, because there are a lot of nuances in the sibling relationship that no one has considered before,” Zapounidis said.

Nutrition Care for Hypertension Management: Patient-Reported Education, Registered Dietitian Referrals and Barriers

Understanding whether people with high blood pressure receive appropriate nutrition guidance and specialized support is important toward improving hypertension management.

Anastasia Bashkirtseva, a graduate of TMU’s Nutrition and Food program, surveyed 350 participants online to learn whether Ontario adults with high blood pressure received nutrition education from their health-care providers and to identify barriers. Most participants were middle-aged (35–64), female, white and held an undergraduate degree.

The findings revealed significant gaps. Sixty per cent of participants reported receiving no nutrition information from any health-care provider, while nearly 80 per cent had not been referred to a registered dietitian. Of the 71 participants who received a referral, only 15 were referred specifically for blood pressure management.

“Registered dietitians are the experts in the field, so we would love to see more referrals,” said Bashkirtseva, who was supervised by nutrition professor Daniela Malta.

The main barriers to seeking dietitian care were not knowing how to find one, cost and lack of insurance. Bashkirtseva is now reviewing research on health-care providers’ attitudes and barriers to providing nutrition education and plans a national study to see whether these Ontario-specific findings apply across Canada.

Re:Source: Developing Circular Terracotta Composites Through KUKA Robotic Fabrication for Architectural Applications

The construction industry generates significant waste. Third-year architectural science student Mahiya Majeed wanted to know whether some of it could be reused to create stronger, more sustainable building materials. 

Working with architectural science professor Vincent Hui, she tested how adding varying amounts of ceramic and gypsum waste from drywall and plaster to extruded terracotta, a widely used building material, affected waste-derived clay composites.

In TMU’s Digital Fabrication Lab, the team used robotic extrusion to shape the prepared terracotta composites into custom forms, exploring components that are structurally strong and climate responsive. The approach could also be adapted to simpler machines, such as standard 3D printers.

The findings showed that certain waste materials enhanced the terracotta’s performance, suggesting opportunities for more circular building systems. The research also explored potential underwater applications, including hydroponic planters for year-round plant growth and artificial reef structures to support aquatic ecosystems.

“Through this project, I feel really confident in my design and research skills,” said Majeed. “I’m going to be presenting this project in Spain at the ICERI conference [International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation] alongside global Mitacs students from Hong Kong, Brazil and Taiwan.”

Design and Validation of a Tendon-Driven Dexterous Robotic Hand for Surgical Manipulation

Ahmed Tabl recently completed his undergraduate degree in computer engineering and is now pursuing his Master’s of Applied Science in Biomedical Engineering. Tabl worked with electrical, computer and biomedical engineering professor Ali Tavallaei to develop a robotic hand for surgeons.

“Surgical platforms already exist, but they’re very task-specific,” Tabl said. “The idea we have is more generalization. When you have an almost human hand in the room, you can perform a lot more than just one aspect of the surgery.”

For now, the team built a single robotic finger, with the goal of refining the design before building an entire hand. They tested how much load the finger could handle and checked that its movements remained consistent over 30 minutes. “In the surgical field you want extremely precise movement,” Tabl explained. “For example, an artery has a diameter of about three millimetres. If the hand is drifting over time, you can actually injure the patient.”

Quantum Test Quality Attributes

As quantum computing advances, reliable, efficient and trustworthy software will be essential to turn its potential into real-world applications. Fifth-year computer science student Hamidreza Khoramrokh is investigating what makes quantum software testing effective and how researchers assess test quality.

Under the supervision of computer science professor Andriy Miranskyy, Khoramrokh reviewed existing research to understand how developers test quantum software and measure its quality. The team aims to bring together current knowledge to help developers evaluate their software and build more reliable, efficient quantum applications.

Early findings suggest that testing quantum software is challenging because it requires significant computing resources and specialized knowledge of quantum physics. This highlights the need for testing methods that are both effective and practical for developers.

“There’s a huge barrier to getting started with quantum testing — you need to understand not just coding, but the physics behind qubits and quantum states, and there aren’t many simple, user-friendly tools to help students and new developers learn,” said Khoramrokh.

By synthesizing existing research, the team hopes to make quantum software testing more accessible and support the development of reliable quantum applications.

Gatekeeping: How Competition Shapes Product Information Sharing

Most people think of themselves as helpful, willing to share information with others about new products and services. Businesses count on this, because word-of-mouth marketing organically spreads awareness.

Are we all as eager to share as we believe? Fourth-year marketing student Tim Aliev wanted to learn whether people would let others know about a product they viewed as particularly beneficial, especially if sharing the information might lessen their own chances of success. 

Working with marketing management professor Matthew Philp, Aliev designed a scenario where 121 people learned about a fictitious AI resume tool. Later, participants were told another job seeker had asked whether they knew of any resources that could improve a resume and cover letter.

“What we found was that in a scenario where you are sharing this product with a person who is in direct competition with you, not only are you becoming quieter but people are actually actively hiding the information,” Aliev said.

The Social World of Sloths

Kelvin Doe, who recently graduated from TMU’s New Media program, spent his summer building robots intended to mimic the behaviour of sloths, the slow-moving mammals who spend most of their lives hanging among the trees.

Under the supervision of new media professor Steve Daniels, Doe went through four iterations of his design, working each time to better duplicate a living sloth’s movements and behaviour. His fourth design incorporated light and sonar sensors so that two robotic sloths could approach each other while hanging from a suspended line, then move apart again. 

“It was kind of finicky at the initial phase, so we added a bearing system, which stabilizes the mechanics of the sloth,” Doe said. “In the long term, we also want to reduce its length.”

The sloths are currently battery-powered, but Doe is investigating whether he can power his robotic creatures using renewable energy derived from moss.