With a passion for driving change and creating impact, Mahdi co-founded 5REDO to facilitate and expedite the adoption of circular economy principles in Canada. Mahdi is an alumnus of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s From Linear to Circular Programme in 2021. He also played a key role in developing and managing the University of British Columbia’s (UBC) Circular Economy Seed Funding program aimed at fostering partnership development between companies and academic researchers to co-create solutions for the circular economy.
As a Research Engineer at UBC, Mahdi has supported the development of interdisciplinary research collaboration in materials, manufacturing, sustainability, and health. His contribution has been instrumental in establishing and coordinating UBC’s Cluster of Research Excellence in Biocomposites. Mahdi also led the development of a proposal, with participation of a team of faculty members at UBC Okanagan, which brought about a six-year funding from the Government of Canada to launch a specialized graduate degree program in immersive technologies, starting in the Fall of 2021. He also founded the Multidisciplinary Undergraduate Research Projects in Health at UBC Okanagan which provides undergraduates with a unique platform to experience collaboration across disciplines.
Mahdi has a strong track record of research in materials and manufacturing with publications in prestigious journals such as Science, Nature Communications, and Advanced Materials. He also holds multiple certifications in sustainability, including Engineering Design for a Circular Economy, Sustainable Materials Management, Biobased Products for a Sustainable Bioeconomy, Cradle to Cradle Certified Catalyst, and Sustainable Packaging in a Circular Economy. He is currently pursuing a micro-master’s degree in MBA Core Curriculum from the University of Maryland.
Mahdi has a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Ryerson University in Toronto. He also completed a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where he conducted research on advanced materials and 3D-printing technologies. He is also a Professional Engineer as a member of Engineers and Geoscientists BC.