Current Research Interests

Drinking Water Treatment

Chemical disinfection processes; especially their kinetics against microorganisms and methods for design and scaleup
Inactivation of emerging pathogens by disinfectants
Novel kinetic models for disinfection processes and process control
Use of computational fluid dynamics for process modeling

Assessment of risks from exposures to deliberately released agents (e.g., anthrax)
Engineering analysis and optimization of chemical decontamination schemes
Appropriate sensing equipment for water utilities to monitor deliberate contamination

Microbiological risks associated with diverse exposures
- pathogens in drinking water and recreational waters
- pathogens in biosolids (sludges)
- pathogens in food (including E. coli O157:H7, Campylobacteria and Listeria)
- risks from personal household exposures, and prevention using anti-microbial agents
Chemical Mixtures
- development of dose-response models for mixtures of agents
Fundamental methodology

Center for Advancing Microbial Risk Assessment (CAMRA): This is a 5-year $10 million project jointly funded by the US Department of Homeland Security and the US Environmental Protection Agency. I am co-Director of this center, which involves 6 universities, led by Michigan State University. The CAMRA home page is here.
Collaborative Large-scale Engineering Analysis Network for Environmental Research (CLEANER): I am co-PI of this effort funded by the National Science Foundation to develop a network of field facilities to advance our knowledge of the fundamental science and engineering of water quality and quantity. The Project is headed by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the web site is here.
DeVaWaSte (Delaware Valley Water Source Tracking Effort). With funding from the Philadelphia Water Department, we are developing a library of microbial strains and their phenotypic and genotypic qualities in order to establish a database for use in determining sources of pollution (no web site yet for this).
Working with a group of colleagues, we have received funding for a program of PhD fellowships from the US Department of Education on "Educating Rennaissance Engineers". More information on this initiative can be found here.