Lisa Alvarez-Cohen
Fred and Claire Sauer Professor of Environmental Engineering
Environmental Engineering
Research Areas: Environmental microbiology and ecology, biotransformation and fate of environmental and wastewater contaminants, and innovative molecular and isotopic techniques for studying microbial ecology of communities involved in wastewater treatment and bioremediation communities.
Sample Projects: Oxygenase-Catalyzed Biodegradation of Emerging Water Contaminants: 1,4-Dioxane and N-Nitrosodimethylamine; Quantifying Gene Expression to Predict and Optimize Reductive Dechlorination by Dehalococcoides spp.; Application of Microarrays to Identify Biomarkers of Reductive Dehalogenating-Microbial Communities; Using Molecular and Isotopic Tools to Characterize the Biodegradation of Chlorinated Ethenes and Ethanes; and Characterizing the fate and biotransformation of fluorochemicals in aqueous film forming forms (AFFF).
Ashok Gadgil
Professor
ENV Program, Civil and Environmental Engineering
Research Areas: Drinking Water Treatment; Technology Innovation; Technology Maturation for Impact
Sample projects: Arsenic remediation of groundwater used for drinking; Advanced technologies for Capacitive Deionization; Low cost effective remediation of excess fluoride from groundwater used for drinking
Ted Grantham
Assistant Cooperative Extension Specialist and Adjunct Assistant Professor; Co-Director of the Cannabis Research Center at UC Berkeley
Environmental Science, Policy, and Management
Research Areas: freshwater ecology; surface water hydrology; water resources management
Sample projects: Eco-hydrology of intermittent streams; managing water for the environment; freshwater ecosystem vulnerability to climate change; environmental impacts of cannabis production
Slav Hermanowicz
Professor of the Graduate School
Environmental Engineering
Research Areas: Biological water and wastewater treatment processes; biofilms and their development; analysis of full-scale treatment reactors; nutrient control; sustainable development
Sample Projects: Deammonification of anaerobic sludge digestate; Better drinking water quality in storage; Solar optics-based active pasteurization for greywater reuse and integrated thermal building control; Physics of foaming in anaerobic digesters; Sustainable development: physical and moral issues; New sources of water; Toward a definition of sustainability.
Arpad Horvath
Professor
Energy, Civil Infrastructure and Climate Engineering and Project Management
Research Areas: Life-cycle environmental and economic assessment of products, processes, and services, particularly answering important questions about civil infrastructure systems and the built environment: transportation systems, water and wastewater systems, biofuels, pavements, buildings, and construction materials.
Sample Projects: Environmental implications of various products, processes and services, in particular, transportation systems, water and wastewater systems, biofuels, pavements, buildings, and construction materials.
Susan S. Hubbard
Associate Laboratory Director, Earth and Environmental Sciences, Berkeley Lab; Adjunct Professor UC Berkeley
Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management (ESPM)
Research Areas: Development and use of advanced characterization approaches to provide new insights about terrestrial hydrological and biogeochemical functioning relevant to contaminant remediation, carbon cycling, water resources, and subsurface energy challenges.
Sample Projects: Watershed Function Scientific Focus Area – Developing a predictive understanding of how mountainous watersheds retain and release water and the implications for downgradient water discharge and biogeochemical cycles, particularly in response to floods, droughts and other episodic through decadal perturbations. The project is focused in a headwaters catchment in the Upper Colorado River Basin. Partners: Colorado School of Mines, Desert Research Institute, Fort Lewis College, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, University of Arizona, Navarro, Subsurface Insights, UC Berkeley; Next Generation Ecosystem Experiment (NGEE) -Artic (Improved prediction of ecosystem feedback to climate in vulnerable Arctic systems through iterative and multi-scale observations, experiments and simulations). Partners: ORNL (lead), LANL, BNL, University of Fairbanks AK.
Michael Kiparsky
Director of the Wheeler Water Institute
Center for Law, Energy & the Environment, UC Berkeley School of Law
Research Areas: Water resources policy and management; science-policy interface; translational research and synthesis
Sample Projects: Evaluating and Improving the Relationships Between Regulation and Innovation in the Wastewater Sector; Developing Water Data Systems to Improve Decision Making; Recharge Net Metering to Enhance Groundwater Sustainability; Addressing Institutional Vulnerabilities in California’s Water Allocation Institutions; Evaluating the Benefits for and Pathways to Small Water System Consolidations
Baoxia Mi
Assistant Professor
Environmental Engineering and Energy, Civil Infrastructure and Climate (ECIC)
Research Areas: Advanced water treatment technology, membrane process, water and wastewater reuse, desalination, environmental nanotechnology, interfacial and transport phenomena
Sample Projects: Graphene-based membranes for water purification; Hybrid membrane systems for enhanced water and energy sustainability; Fundamental understanding of fouling and transport mechanisms in membrane processes
Kara Nelson
Professor
Environmental Engineering
Research Areas: Detection, removal, and inactivation of pathogens in water and sludge; Water reuse; Natural treatment systems; Drinking water and sanitation in developing countries.
Sample Projects: Disinfection of Water by Sunlight; Evaluation of 24×7 versus Intermittent Water Supply in Hubli-Dharwad, India; Tertiary Treatment for Water Reuse; Wastewater Irrigation of Food Crops; and Stormwater Treatment by Bioinfiltration.
Alison E. Post
Associate Professor
Political Science and Global Metropolitan Studies
Research areas: Institutions for urban water delivery; politics of water management and distribution, especially in the Global South; private sector participation in water delivery; water intermittency; human right to water.
Sample Projects: Foreign and Domestic Investment in Argentina: The Politics of Privatized Infrastructure; How Investor Portfolios Shape Regulatory Outcomes: Privatized Infrastructure After Crises; Information and Intermittent Water: An Impact Evaluation in Bangalore, India; Does Codifying the Human Right to Water Change Public Opinion?
Albert Ruhi
Assistant Professor
Department of Environmental Science, Policy, & Management
Research Areas: Freshwater Ecology
Sample Projects: 2019-23 Collaborative Proposal: NSF MSB-FRA: Scaling Climate, Connectivity, and Communities in Streams; 2019-20 California Institute for Water Resources (CIWR) Water Research Program. Towards a Mechanistic Understanding of the Multi-Scale Effects of Drought on Riverine Biodiversity; 2019-20 California Department of Fish and Wildlife Awards. Reconnecting Delta food webs: evaluating the influence of tidal marsh restoration on energy flow and prey availability for native fishes; 2019-20 Subaward from the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center, University of Maryland. Advancing quantitative methods to understand causal pathways and feedbacks within complex socio-hydrological systems.
David Sedlak
Co-Director of Berkeley Water Center, Malozemoff Professor in Mineral Engineering, Director of Institute for Environmental Science and Engineering (IESE)
Environmental Engineering
Research Areas: Environmental chemistry, water recycling, contaminant fate in receiving waters, natural treatment systems, reinvention of urban water systems
Sample Projects: The Fate of Trace Organic Compounds in Treatment Wetlands, In Situ Chemical Oxidation of Persistent Organic Contaminants
William T. Stringfellow
Professor & Director Ecological Engineering Research Program
Earth & Environmental Sciences Area; Energy Geosciences Division; Geochemistry Department; Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Research Areas: Industrial waste treatment and water quality, with an emphasis on engineered biological systems. Expertise includes treatment and management of industrial wastewater, including agricultural drainage water. Research experience includes combined physical-biological treatment, treatment wetlands, bioremediation, environmental impact assessment, watershed-scale water quality management, and eutrophication.
Sample Projects: Impact of oil field chemicals on the safe use of produced water for irrigated agriculture; Pre-treatment of non-traditional waters prior to desalinization ;Large-scale groundwater recharge as an alternative to surface storage; Biological degradation of quaternary ammonium compounds and other biocides.