past faculty RESEARCH
Each year, the Montana Water Center awards funding to Montana University System faculty through the Faculty Seed Grant Program. See below for more information on past Faculty Seed Grant projects.
2015 FACULTY SEED GRANTS
Dr. Ellen Lauchnor: Using beneficial bacteria and biofilm engineering to help filter wastewater and improve water quality
Dr. Ellen Lauchnor is providing new solutions for improving water quality throughout Montana. Currently serving as associate professor of Civil Engineering at Montana State University, Dr. Lauchnor's research aims to improve state-wide water quality by incorporating biofilm engineering into wastewater treatment plant design and operation.
In wastewater treatment plants, microorganisms degrade waste products in the wastewater that we generate, allowing clean water to be returned to nearby rivers and streams. Some of the waste contains nitrogen compounds, which are essential nutrients but can be harmful to humans and aquatic life if too much is released into surface water.
Specific bacteria called nitrifying and denitrifying bacteria help to consume the nitrogen compounds and remove them from the wastewater. However, the presence of chemicals from industries and household products sent down the drain can prevent the microorganisms from cleaning nitrogen from the water, thus reducing the water quality downstream.
Dr. Lauchnor's research will determine the impacts of certain chemicals from household and industrial use on the nitrifying bacteria and their ability to help with nitrogen removal. Her science team will use laboratory bioreactors to cultivate bacteria sampled from a local wastewater treatment plant.
A strategy for improving the ability to treat the nitrogen in the wastewater will be to cultivate the bacteria as aggregates attached to surfaces, or biofilms, instead of free floating in the wastewater. In this state, the bacteria may be more protected from chemicals when they are present in the wastewater. The end goal of this research will be to provide new insights that can be used in the future for improving wastewater treatment plant design and operation.
DR. JAMIE MCEVOY: ASSESSING NATURAL INFRASTRUCTURE
The term natural infrastructure refers to riparian areas, floodplains, and wetlands, which all play an important role in slowing runoff and promoting groundwater recharge (i.e., water storage). Given that climate change is projected to affect the quantity, quality, and timing of water availability in Montana, there is increased concern about the state’s water storage capacity.
Dr. Jamie McEvoy will explore the human dimensions of water resources management, and will assess the capacity of natural infrastructure to increase water storage, reduce vulnerability to floods, and enhance resiliency to climate change.
Using the Musselshell River Basin in central Montana as a research site, this project will also fund one masters student in the Department of Earth Sciences to quantify the natural storage potential of the current and historic floodplain of the Musselshell River, and to identify socio-political barriers and opportunities for restoring and enhancing natural infrastructure in the basin.
(Dr. McEvoy is currently the Associate Director at the Arizona Water Resources Research Center)
DR. Benjamin Poulter: WATER - THE CURRENCY OF THE WEST
Water is the ecological currency of the West. Water limits the productivity of croplands, grassland and forests, creates habitat for commercial and recreational fisheries, controls wildfire, insect and disease outbreaks, and provides energy directly for hydropower or indirectly in oil and gas extraction.
The past 50 years have seen changes in stream and river flows across the Upper Missouri River Basin and within watersheds in Montana resulting from changes in land use, water management and climate raising concerns on how water can be managed in the 21st century.
In collaboration with scientists at Montana State University, University of Montana, the U.S. Geological Survey and the Wildlife Conservation Society, the challenge of understanding water in the West will be addressed with a new ecosystem modeling approach.
A detailed ecosystem model, representing carbon and water fluxes through soils and vegetation, and vegetation responses to climate, disturbance and competition, will be coupled with a network of streams, so that feedbacks between changes in upland controls on water are connected with stream flow. Because the modeling approach couples processes on land with flows of water in streams, the effects of land and water management can be evaluated in the context of long-term effects on stream flow and on effects to hydrologic resiliency to climate change.
(Dr. Ben Poulter currently leads the Warming Induced Emissions program at Spark Climate Solutions)