Calgary, AB (September 26, 2008) A new ground-motion detector has garnered lead inventor Lee Danisch a $25,000 award from the Ernest C. Manning Awards Foundation. Danisch, the Founder and President of high-tech start-up company Measurand Inc. will receive the Dave Mitchell Award of Distinction on October 3, 2008.

Danisch's award-winning technology, called ShapeAccelArray™ (SAA), automatically detects the subtle movements in ground or structures that forewarn of dangerous landslides or earthquakes, and relays this information over the wireless Internet. With the existing techniques that SAA replaces, such motion is impossible to detect in a timely manner. In contrast, SAA allows people to predict landslides before they occur, so they can take preventative action. "Peoples' lives are directly affected by what we're measuring," Danisch says.

Fully introduced just two years ago, SAA is now used to monitor dangerous landslide zones near highways, bridges, railroads and construction sites in Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia. The device is also used for research at earthquake-simulation facilities, including one of the world's largest, the National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention in Japan.

The idea for SAA grew out of Lee Danisch's prior innovations in shape-sensing technology. Measurand are the makers of ShapeTape™, a ribbon-like, wireless device that monitors body movements and is used in crash-testing, computer animation and space science.

A 15-person company in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Measurand has made over one half million Can$ from sales of SAA since 2006.

The Ernest C. Manning Awards Foundation
This year the Foundation will award $165,000 in prize money. Four awards, totalling $145,000, will go to leading Canadian innovators. Another $20,000 will go to Young Canadians chosen at the 2008 Canada-Wide Science Fair.

The Foundation was established in 1980 in the name of prominent Alberta statesman, Ernest C. Manning, to promote and support Canadian innovators. Since 1982, the Foundation has presented over $3.9 million in prize money through its annual awards program. The 2008 awards will be presented at an awards gala on Friday, October 3 in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

• A Media Backgrounder about the innovators and their work is now available on the Foundation’s website, with video available after October 3, 2008: www.manningawards.ca
• For more information on the Foundation, contact Bruce Fenwick, Executive Director: 403-645-8288 or bruce.fenwick@encana.com
• For more information about Measurand and their products, visit http://www.measurand.com/ or contact Mr. Lee Danisch: 506-462-9119 or lee@measurand.com