IP Osgoode founded this , presented yearly during Osgoode convocation to mark Prof. David Vaver’s for his leadership in intellectual property as “a scholar and mentor”.

The medal, befitting of Prof. Vaver’s influence on intellectual property law, is an original piece of artwork created by Toronto-based artist, . IP Osgoode awards the medal yearly to an Osgoode student in the graduating class who merits special recognition for outstanding achievements in the area of intellectual property law. Importantly, the student’s achievements extend beyond academic excellence, and can include significant contributions to research in intellectual property and related areas or exceptional commitment and enthusiasm through their participation in intellectual property-related extra-curricular activities.

We could not have selected a more deserving candidate to receive the IP Osgoode David Vaver Medal for Excellence in IP than Ian Stedman. During his time at Osgoode, Ian distinguished himself beyond his stellar doctoral work and demonstrated tireless enthusiasm and dedication to enhancing the spirit of IP at Osgoode, volunteering countless hours in organizing “” conference for the past three years. Ian also serves as a member of 91��ɫ’s  and as a member of SickKids Hospital’s Artificial Intelligence in Medicine for Kids (AIM4Kids) Task Force. As of July 1, 2020, Ian has accepted a full-time tenure track position of Assistant Professor of Canadian Public Law & Governance in the School of Public Policy within the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies at 91��ɫ.

Congratulations to Ian and wishing him every success in his career in IP!

Giuseppina D’Agostino is the Founder & Director of IP Osgoode, the IP Intensive Program, and the Innovation Clinic, the Editor-in-Chief for the IPilogue and the Intellectual Property Journal, and an Associate Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School.

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The project being funded, “Rebooting Infant Pain Assessment,” could give voice to preterm infants’ subjective experiences of pain, despite their inability to speak. The study will use machine learning to exponentially improve neonatal intensive care unit practice.

Pillai Riddell is the principal investigator (PI), with Professors Steven Wang (co-PI, Faculty of Science) and Aijun An (co-investigator, Lassonde School of Engineering) and Ian Stedman (Osgoode Hall Law School). Pillai Riddell is leading a team of 16 individuals across two countries and six sites. This is a highly collaborative international venture and it exemplifies cross-Faculty collaboration at 91��ɫ.

“The AI (artificial intelligence) component in this project is important because it is enabling us to use continuous brain activity in a proposed clinical pain assessment application – to our knowledge, that’s a first anywhere in the world,” says Pillai Riddell. “91��ɫ’s partnership with UCL (University College London) and McMaster University in this venture is a fantastic synergy of our combined expertise of behavioural and biological infant distress responses. I am thrilled to then be able to take our health content knowledge and take it to the next level with cutting-edge 91��ɫ U artificial intelligence scientists in two sector-leading neonatal intensive care units – one in Canada (Mount Sinai) and one in the U.K. (University College London Hospital).

“Moreover, this special Tri-Council opportunity inspired us to invite new social scientists at Osgoode Hall Law School (Ian Stedman) and University of Calgary to explore the ethical and social implications of computer-assisted clinical decision-making,” she adds.

Desperate need for a better way forward for infant pain assessment

The need is great. Unmanaged pain in hospitalized infants has serious long-term complications. However, to manage pain, one must have accurate infant pain assessment. Infants cannot self-report their pain and current infant pain assessment tools used by health professionals have major problems because of the lack of specificity of current tools and bias in the caregivers who use these scales.

The researchers believe they have found a path towards a solution. “Our international team of knowledge users and health/natural science/engineering/social science researchers have come together to build a machine learning algorithm that will learn how to discriminate invasive and non-invasive distress,” Pillai Riddell explains.

Three hundred babies and their mothers will be studied

A sample of 300 preterm infants and their mothers will be involved during a routine painful procedure. Pain indicators, such as facial grimacing, heart rate, brain electrical activity and oxygen levels will be used to train the algorithm to discriminate between the different types of distress.

“The complexity of pain requires a machine learning solution that is capable of modelling individual patterns of brain, behaviour and physiology during pain,” Pillai Riddell explains.

This article was originally posted on .

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Reposted here is the Abstract of an article by Aviv Gaon and Ian Stedman to be published in a forthcoming issue of the .  A copy of the article is also available on .

is a Lecturer at The Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Israel, and PhD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

is a Fellow in Artificial Intelligence Ethics and Law at SickKids’ Centre for Computational Medicine and PhD Candidate at Osgoode Law School.

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The task force, sponsored by 91��ɫ’s VP Academic and Provost and VP Research & Innovation, will be developing ideas and examining options for building and featuring 91��ɫ’s research strengths in the area of Artificial Intelligence. This taskforce, Co-Chaired by Prof. D’Agostino, and Prof. , will leverage collegial expertise, solicit advice and generate recommendations towards how 91��ɫ can advance research and take advantage of research, scholarship and academic opportunities in this area.

As an independent and authoritative voice, which explores legal governance issues at the intersection of intellectual property and technology, IP Osgoode is looking forward to working very closely with the AI task force to help develop AI scholarship, research and academic programs.

We invite our members and readership to provide us with any comments or suggestions that you may have for the AI task force.

Following up on the huge success of our event, we will be organizing another conference focused on AI and data governance in March 2019, so please visit for announcements of our upcoming AI related events, blogs and initiatives.

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