Environmental Engineering Commons^™

Leading Change During The Convergence Of An Epidemic And A Pandemic, Sarah Oerther, Daniel B. Oerther

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

As the first wave of COVID-19 cases spread around the globe in early 2020, the healthcare community adopted a medical model that emphasized the use of resources to mitigate viral spread (Oerther & Watson, 2020). Schools, churches, and businesses shutdown, and healthcare facilities – from outpatient clinics to inpatient elective surgeries – were closed or cancelled. Even long-term care facilities, such as nursing homes, limited access of visitors to patients in an attempt at mitigation. And for six months, the healthcare community focused almost exclusively on a medical response to COVID-19, securing stockpiles of ventilators and fast-tracking vaccine development.

Assessing Grassed Waterway Implementation Using Acpf And Swat Models, Kirsten Schaefer

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Agriculture is the most significant contributor of nonpoint source pollutants in US waterways, with sediment being the most prevalent cause of impairments. Sediment loss mitigation occurs through Best Management Practices (BMPs), such as grassed waterways. Federal and state agencies incentivize the implementation of BMPs through cost-share programs for farmers. The investment of public funds has increased pressure to demonstrate the effectiveness and value of individual projects, necessitating the development of strategies for prioritizing projects based on the sensitivity of sites to sediment erosion and optimal locations for implementation. This study has three primary objectives: (i) document existing locations of grassed …

Neonicotinoid Pesticide And Nitrate Removal In Floating Treatment Wetlands, Julia Lindgren

Department of Environmental Engineering: Theses and Other Student Research

Nutrient and pesticide concentrations in surface water are a growing concern in the Midwest. Floating treatment wetlands (FTWs) are often used to remove excess nutrients from surface water and should be considered for removal of emerging contaminants, such as neonicotinoids. Therefore, the objectives for this research project were: 1) Determine FTW neonicotinoid removal capacity, 2) Quantify neonicotinoid incorporation into floating macrophytes, and 3) Explore potential implications of neonicotinoids on microbial denitrification. A microcosm and mesocosm experiment was completed. The mesocosm experiment evaluated 3 treatments: 1) FTW mesocosm with neonicotinoids, 2) FTW without neonicotinoids, and 3) mesocosm with neonicotinoids and without …

Chemical Interfacial Reactions Affecting The Speciation And Solubility Of Uranium In Organic-Rich Environments, Carmen A. Velasco

Civil Engineering ETDs

The aim of this dissertation was to investigate the interfacial reactions between uranium (U) and natural organic matter NOM) affecting the solubility, adsorption, and precipitation of U in organic-rich environments. The chemical interactions between U and NOM are not well understood, which justified the following research objectives: 1) Identify the effect of pH on U speciation and the organic functional chemistry in mineralized deposits from the Jackpile Mine.; 2) Identify the precipitation of U(VI) and NOM as a function of pH (2, 4 and 7); 3) Identify changes in DOM chemistry due to the reaction of NOM and U at …

Risk Of Injury Analysis In Depth Jump And Squat Jump, Curtis L. Tomasevicz, Jeffrey C. Woldstad, [email protected]

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

Introduction: The depth jump (DJ) and squat jump (SJ) are accepted ways to assess and train power producing ability but are not without risk of injury. Methods: Sixteen male participants (age = 21.7 ± 1.54 yrs., height = 177.7 ± 11.4 cm, mass = 77.7 ± 13.6 kg) were evaluated for power exertion capabilities while being assessed for risk of injury in the knee and low back through a range of resistances based on a percentage of participants’ heights in the DJ (0% through 50%) and bodyweights for the SJ (0% through 100%). Two variables were used to assess the …

Comparative Analyses Of Variable And Fixed Rate Irrigation And Nitrogen Management For Maize In Different Soil Types: Part I. Impact On Soil-Water Dynamics And Crop Evapotranspiration, Vasudha Sharma, Suat Irmak

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

Understanding the soil-water dynamics and maize evapotranspiration (ETc) under variable rate irrigation (VRI) and variable rate fertigation (VRF) management with respect to soil spatial variability constitutes the basis for developing effective variable rate water and nitrogen management strategies. This long-term research was designed to quantify and compare the soil-water dynamics, including available water (AW), and ETc during vegetative and reproductive growth periods of VRI, fixed rate irrigation (FRI) and no-irrigation (NI) under fixed rate fertigation (FRF), VRF and pre-plant (PP) nitrogen management in three different soil types [Crete silt loam (S1); Hastings silty clay loam (S2) and Hastings silt loam …

Modeling Distributed Source Control Infrastructure At Neighborhood Scale For Mitigating Flood Risk In Amite River Watershed, Ahmad Amin Shefai

LSU Master's Theses

Flooding has always been a major threat to mankind. This is particularly true in urban areas due to urbanization-induced increasing impervious areas and subsequent increasing urban surface runoff, causing an increasing flooding risk to urban areas in spite of the fact that extensive flood control infrastructure has been constructed. The overall goal of this thesis is to present a distributed source control infrastructure-based approach for mitigating the flood risk. The new flood mitigation approach is demonstrated through the model implementation of a series of distributed source control infrastructure systems in the city of Denham Springs at a neighborhood scale. The …

Coral Reef Restoration In The Tropical West Atlantic Amid The Covid-19 Pandemic, Linden Cheek

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Climate change is increasing threats to coasts, both from storm surge and sea level rise. Healthy coral reefs provide reduction in storm surges, wave energy, coastal flooding and everyday erosion, and are found across a variety of spatial scales. Given the state of coral reefs worldwide, active Coral Reef Restoration (CRR) in emerging as a necessary component of coastal protection. CRR can be classified as a nature-based solutions (NbS) for coastal protection that also provides a multitude of ecosystem-based services to both humans and other life. Nearly all literature on coral restoration efforts assume a steady-state of human-ecological interactions, but …

A Framework For Assessing The Reliability, Availability, Maintainability, And Safety (Rams) Of Decentralized Sanitation, Adefunké Adeosun

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In established industry sectors, Reliability, Availability, Maintainability, and Safety (RAMS) risk assessments are normally used to compare the risks associated with different technologies on process units. Sanitation solutions are split into traditional wastewater treatment which is centralized treatment and can be classified as an established industry, and decentralized treatment such as pit latrines and septic tank systems which are on much smaller scales. Also they can be classified as non-conventional methods such as reinvented advanced decentralized non-sewered sanitation solution techniques exist mainly in two forms as “Single-User Reinvented Toilet (SURT)” systems or “Multiple-User Reinvented Toilet (MURT)” systems. Advanced decentralized non-sewered …

Water-Energy Nexus: Studies On Salinity Gradient Energy Harvest And Desalination, Guangcai Tan

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Water and energy are fundamentally linked, and both are important for the development of human society. The demand for renewable energy and freshwater are two global challenges in the 21^st century. Herein, a novel chloride-ion (Cl⁻) concentration flow cell (CFC) based on two symmetrical electrodes (BiCl₃, CoCl₂, VCl₃, or BiOCl) separately by a cation-exchange membrane was used as an efficient method to recover salinity gradient (SG) energy. The CFC with metal chloride electrodes (BiCl₃, CoCl₂, and VCl₃) was based on Cl⁻ extraction/insertion, and that …

Improvement Of The Effectiveness Of Greywacke Crushing Process By Applying An Impact Crusher In Quarry For The Production Of Railway Ballast, Krzysztof Kurus, Karolina Jąderko-Skubis

Journal of Sustainable Mining

The production of aggregates in rock mining requires an optimal system of crushers, separators and conveyors. Proper machine selection allows to obtain aggregates with appropriate technical parameters and increase the output of required fractions with a given unit cost. The usage of rock raw materials for the production of railway ballast used in the railway track superstructure is connected with the necessity to meet strictly defined quality requirements.

This paper presents an example of the use of an impact crusher in a selected quarry for the purpose of obtaining the correct parameters of railway ballast and a suitable grain curve. …

Atmospheric Measurements With Unmanned Aerial Systems (Uas), Marcelo I. Guzman

Chemistry Faculty Publications

This Special Issue provides the first literature collection focused on the development and implementation of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) and their integration with sensors for atmospheric measurements on Earth. The research covered in the Special Issue combines chemical, physical, and meteorological measurements performed in field campaigns as well as conceptual and laboratory work. Useful examples for the development of platforms and autonomous systems for environmental studies are provided, which demonstrate how careful the operation of sensors aboard UAS must be to gather information for remote sensing in the atmosphere. The work serves as a key collection of articles to introduce …

P-Cresol Biogenesis During Bioremediation Aimed At Stimulating Chlorinated Solvent Dehalogenation, Alexis Gathings

LSU Master's Theses

The broad goal of the research described in this thesis was to better understand the potential for biologically mediated production of p-cresol in groundwater at a Superfund site located in south Louisiana. Previous literature reports that microorganisms known to carry out the transformation from L-tyrosine to p-cresol occur in diverse environments.

In the research described in this thesis, studies were conducted utilizing groundwater from the Superfund site during the course of enhanced in situ bioremediation practices aimed at stimulating reductive dehalogenation of chlorinated solvent contamination. Microbial communities established with groundwater sampled from the Superfund site were observed to …

Laboratory Results And Mathematical Modeling Of Spore Surface Interactions In Stormwater Runoff, Anne M. Mikelonis, Katherine Ratliff, Sungmin Youn

All Engineering Faculty Research

Development of numerical models to predict stormwater-mediated transport of pathogenic spores in the environment depends on an understanding of adhesion forces that dictate detachment after rain events. Zeta potential values were measured in the laboratory for Bacillus globigii and Bacillus thuringiensis kurstaki, two common surrogates used to represent Bacillus anthracis, in synthetic baseline ultrapure water and laboratory prepared stormwater. Zeta potential curves were also determined for materials representative of urban infrastructure (concrete and asphalt). These data were used to predict the interaction energy between the spores and urban materials using Derjaguin-Landau-Verwey-Overbeek (DLVO) modeling. B. globigii and B. thuringiensis kurstaki …

An Accurate Vegetation And Non-Vegetation Differentiation Approach Based On Land Cover Classification, Chiman Kwan, David Gribben, Bulent Ayhan, Jiang Li, Sergio Bernabe, Antonio Plaza

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Accurate vegetation detection is important for many applications, such as crop yield estimation, landcover land use monitoring, urban growth monitoring, drought monitoring, etc. Popular conventional approaches to vegetation detection incorporate the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), which uses the red and near infrared (NIR) bands, and enhanced vegetation index (EVI), which uses red, NIR, and the blue bands. Although NDVI and EVI are efficient, their accuracies still have room for further improvement. In this paper, we propose a new approach to vegetation detection based on land cover classification. That is, we first perform an accurate classification of 15 or more …

Modeling The Load Of Sars-Cov-2 Virus In Human Expelled Particles During Coughing And Speaking, Yang Wang, Guang Xu, Yue-Wern Huang

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Particle size is an essential factor when considering the fate and transport of virus-containing droplets expelled by human, because it determines the deposition pattern in the human respiratory system and the evolution of droplets by evaporation and gravitational settling. However, the evolution of virus-containing droplets and the size-dependent viral load have not been studied in detail. The lack of this information leads to uncertainties in understanding the airborne transmission of respiratory diseases, such as the COVID-19. In this study, through a set of differential equations describing the evolution of respiratory droplets and by using the SARS-CoV-2 virus as an example, …

Effect Of Membrane Aging And Operating Conditions On The Rejection Of Trace Organics For Potable Reuse, Jose Pedro Hernandez

Civil Engineering ETDs

The aim of this study is to provide a better understanding of the effect that membrane degradation and operating conditions have on the removal of selected organic compounds via reverse osmosis (RO). Originally, the study included laboratory experiments in which ESPA2-LD membranes from Hydranautics were to be chemically damaged and the passage of the suite of trace organics through the membranes was to be evaluated. Unfortunately, the degradation experiments were cut short due to lab closures associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. The study then changed direction to provide insight into the role operating conditions have on the removal of trace …

Water Treatment System With Ultraviolet Leds And Photo-Catalysts, Morgan Russell, John E. Stubbs, David M. Kempisty

AFIT Patents

A reactor system for treating contaminated water is disclosed. The reactor system includes a reactor vessel having first and second end portions and an internal reactor volume defined by interior surfaces of the reactor vessel. A fluoropolymer coating is applied over at least a portion of the interior surfaces of the reactor vessel. The reactor system also includes a water inlet disposed in the first end portion and a water outlet disposed in the second end portion. At least one ultraviolet light-emitting diode (LED) is included and disposed so as to project ultraviolet light into the reactor vessel. A plurality …

A New Technical Solution For Cleaning The Water Intake Structure Of Pumping Stations From Siltation And Its Experimental Research, M.M. Mukhammadiev, S.R. Juraev

Irrigation and Melioration

The article considers one of the most pressing problems of pumping stations in the irrigation system today, their blurring of the bottom of the water intake (avancamera and water intake chambers), analyzes the existing proposals, designs and technical solutions and their advantages and disadvantages. Given the above advantages and disadvantages, a new design has been proposed for the treatment of water intake structures from turbid sediments with minimal energy and capital expenditures, very cheap and simple to operate and reliable. The design includes a turbid suction pump and a turbid pump, as well as a pulp pipeline. The pressurized water …

Assessing Surface Water Features Using Landsat-8 Oli And Sentinel-1 Satellite Images Case Study Sirdaryo Region, S.M. Muratov, Kh.A. Abdivaitov, Sh.F. Rahmatillayev

Irrigation and Melioration

Water resources have become a very big problem in every part of Uzbekistan for several decades. Water is used not only exclusively for agricultural development, but also for many other purposes, such as industrial and chemical activities. Therefore, it is important to study the properties of surface water objects using optical and microwave satellite images. The Syrdarya region was selected for research. Because in the past, there have been no studies of water bodies using satellite images. The article presents the results of studies on the assessment of water properties from optical and microwave satellite images. In research for optical …