The Innovation Challenge is a competitive program designed to foster innovation, research, creativity, and collaboration as students tackle real-world contemporary questions of importance in neuroscience and work together to develop a novel hypothesis and research proposal toward new solutions.
Congratulations to the 2024-2025 finalists!
Dawson Fleck and Riham Jameel took first place for their research proposal investigating their hypothesis “prion protein accumulation in astrocytes during Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) triggers increased expression of Aquaporin-4 (AQP-4) as a reactive response, but this upregulation may be accompanied by mislocalization, thus impairing glymphatic function and exacerbating disease progression.”
Iqra Hassan, Naima Sharif, and Zamzam Mohamed took second place for their research proposal investigating their hypothesis “individuals who receive AI-detection training focused on recognizing facial symmetry, quality of image, and lighting anomalies, will achieve a 10% higher accuracy in detecting AI-generated faces than those without training.”
Lexi Strus, Dilan Sypnieski, Mya Follingstad, and Charlie Pikula took third place for their research proposal investigating their hypothesis “Human accuracy in detecting AI-generated content will be significantly lower for mixed AI-human media compared to entirely AI-generated or entirely human-created content and will vary depending on the type of media (e.g., text, images, or audio).”
Eligibility
All Concordia undergraduate students are eligible. This includes students studying fields outside of neuroscience, first-year students, and those who have not yet conducted research. Students self-select into teams of two to four individuals.
Teams
There is no limit to the number of teams that can participate. Students are encouraged to seek team members with complementary strengths and experiences in order to leverage the advantage of multiple viewpoints, perspectives, and ideas.
Timeline
Early fall semester: Information meeting
Early October: Team registration, question selection
Early November: Checkpoint 1 – preliminary references, brief summary of topic
Early December: Checkpoint 2 – developed hypothesis and reference list, draft of research proposal
Late January: Checkpoint 3 – final hypothesis, reference list, and research proposal (URSCA PEAK eligible)
Mid-March: Checkpoint 4 – proposal presentation (up to 3 teams will be invited after Checkpoint 3 to present)
Benefits
Participants of the Innovation Challenge gain invaluable research experience, sharpen problem-solving skills, harness creativity, develop teamwork, and are eligible to earn an URSCA PEAK.
The program begins in October and finishes in March, giving students the flexibility to develop a schedule that works best for them.
Teams select one of the research question options to guide their work.
Students may seek mentorship from anyone they choose and receive feedback at each checkpoint.
The winning team will also share a cash prize.