Penn State Water Conference and Community Event Agenda

Opening remarks by Tadd Bindas, President, Penn State Association of Water Students

Remarks by Andy Warner, Director, Penn State University Water Consortium

Lightning Talks

• Nathaniel Warner, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Geochemical Forensics
• Lilliard Richardson, School of Public Policy/ College of the Liberal Arts, Public Policy and Water
• Roberto Fernández, Civil and Environmental Engineering and IEE, Enhancing Cold Regions Research at PSU
• Faith Kibuye, Ecosystem Science and Management, Integrating Stakeholder Involvement and Education into Water Resources Management Research
• Sam Prajamthong, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Future Climate Impacts on Community Water Management System in Ban Limthong, Thailand
• Kierstyn Higgins, Ecosystem Science and Management, Rusty Crayfish (Faxonius rusticus) Interactions with Benthic Macroinvertebrates in the Monocacy River
• Eri Wijaya, Biobehavioral Health, College of Health and Human Development, Understanding the Occurrence of Maternal Environmental Enteric Dysfunction and Its Impact on Adverse Birth Outcomes: A prospective Birth Cohort Study in Urban-Slum Areas in Makassar City, Indonesia
• Samuel Shaheen, Geosciences, Abandoned Oil and Gas Well Leakage and Impacts to Aquifer Biogeochemistry
• Junzhu Shen, Geosciences, Monitoring Urban Stormwater from the Surface to the Sewer using Underground Fiber Optic Sensors
• Jeser Nij, Water Resources Engineering, Energy Dissipation and Scour Protection for High Slope Terrains
• Negar Soltani, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Listening to Streams to Quantify Their Discharge
• Ken Davis, Meteorology and Atmospheric Science, An Overview of the Baltimore Social-Environmental Collaborative Urban Integrated Field Laboratory

Panel Discussion: Sailing Through Disciplines: Interdisciplinary Research for Tangible Water Research

Moderator: Praharsh Patel

Panelists

• Andy Warner – Director, Penn State Water Initiative
• Kathryn J. Brasier – Penn State Professor of Rural Sociology
• Hong Wu – Penn State Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture
• Kenneth J. Davis – Penn State Professor of Atmospheric and Climate Science
• Faith Kibuye – Penn State Water Resources Extension Associate

Lunch

Research Presentations (1A and 1B are concurrent sessions)

Climate and Meteorology (1A)
Moderator: Gabe Lara
Room: HUB 129B

• Defining the dominant pattern of United States summertime precipitation variability: The Midwestern-Southeastern Precipitation Dipole
  • Christopher Sala, PSU UP – Meteorology and Atmospheric Science
  • Co-authors: Laifang Li (PSU)
• Monitoring urban stormwater from the surface to the sewer using underground fiber optic sensors
  • Junzhu Shen, PSU UP – Geosciences
  • Co-authors: Tieyuan Zhu (Penn State)
• Hydroclimate risks in the household water-food nexus
  • Lauren Broyles, PSU UP – Civil and Environmental Engineering
  • Co-authors: Alfonso Mejia (Penn State); Emily Pakhtigian (Penn State)

Economics, Water Policy, and Equity (1B)
Moderator: Praharsh Patel
Room: HUB 129C

• Early warning systems, mobile technology, and cholera aversion: Evidence from rural Bangladesh
  • Emily Pakhtigian, PSU UP – Public Policy
  • Co-authors: Sonia Aziz (Moravian Univ.); Ali Akanda (Univ. of Rhode Island); Kevin Boyle (Virginia Tech); SMA Hannifin (icddrb)
• The current state of water resources management in Ukraine
  • Lyudmyla Kuzmych, PSU UP – Agriculture Sciences
• Fueling the Field on Fire: Are Unintended Consequences of Groundwater Conservation Policy Causing Air Pollution Catastrophe in North India?
  • Praharsh Patel, PSU UP – Agriculture Economics, Sociology, and Education
  • Co-authors: Daniel Brent (Penn State)

Ecohydology (2A)
Moderator: Devon Kerins
Room: HUB 129B

• PFAS occurrence and fate in water supplies and agricultural operations around beneficial land use sites
  • Shahin Alam, PSU UP – Agricultural and Biological Engineering
  • Co-authors: Heather Preisendanz
• Atmospheric dryness impacts on crop yields are buffered in soils with higher available water capacity
  • Meetpal Kukal, PSU UP – Agricultural and Biological Engineering
  • Co-authors: S. Irmak (ABE, Penn State); R. Dobos (NRCS, Lincoln, NE); S. Gupta (Univ. of Basel, Switzerland)
• Analysis of the Perception of Plain-sect Community Members Regarding Effects of Drinking Water Quality on Human and Animal Health: Evidence from a Pilot Study in Lancaster County
  • Parmveer Singh, PSU UP – Agricultural Economics, Sociology, and Education
  • Co-authors: Anil Kumar Chaudhary (Penn State)

Hydrologic Systems (2B)
Moderator: Tadd Bindas
Room: HUB 129C

• Using a surface water hydrodynamic model to understand how spatial variability in ocean surge affects groundwater salinization in Delaware Inland Bays
  • Rachel Housego, PSU UP – Geoscience
  • Co-authors: Anner Paldor (Univ. of Delaware); Ryan Frederiks (Univ. of Delaware); Fengyan Shi (Univ. of Delaware); Holly A. Michael (Univ. of Delaware)
• Hydraulics modeling for river restoration and resilient infrastructure
  • Xiaofeng Liu, PSU UP – Civil and Environmental Engineering
     

Poster Session & Cocktail Hour (Food & beverage provided)

• Erin Trouba, Penn State UP – Agriculture Economics, Sociology, and Education; Engaging Stakeholders in Local Water Quality Planning: Pennsylvania Countywide Action Plans
• Marina Howarth, Penn State UP – Civil & Environmental Engineering; A Systematic Review & Meta-Analysis of Nature-Based Solutions for Flood Mitigation
• Rashid Ansari, Penn State UP – Agricultural and Biological Engineering; Quantifying Levees’ Unintended Consequences for Regional Flood Resilience
• Nijesh Puthiyottil, Penn State UP – Agricultural and Biological Engineering; Hydrogeological and Isotopic Evolution of Springs and their Management Strategies in a Micro Watershed of Kosi River, Kumaun Lesser Himalaya, Uttarakhand, India
• Brandon Forsythe, Penn State UP – Earth and Mineral Sciences/ Earth and Environmental Systems Institute; Shale Hills Critical Zone Observatory: A Continuing Resource for Watershed Research.
• Praharsh Patel, Penn State UP – Agriculture Economics, Sociology, and Education; Fueling the Fields on Fire: Are Unintended Consequences of Groundwater Conservation Policy Causing Air Pollution Catastrophe In North India?
• Brian Morris, Penn State UP – Ecosystem Science and Management; Biochar Impacts on Agricultural Landscapes
• Azadeh Mousavi, Penn State UP – Civil and Environmental Engineering; Flow and Bathymetric Responses around Engineered Log Jams (ELJs)
• Devon Kerins, Penn State UP – Civil and Environmental Engineering; Digging through the Subsurface with Reactive Transport Modeling: How Carbon Transformation and Transport Changes in a Warmer and Drier Mountain Watershed
• Samuel Shaheen, Penn State UP – Geosciences; Abandoned Oil and Gas Well Leakage and Impacts to Aquifer Biogeochemistry
• Abigail Knapp, Penn State UP – Civil and Environmental Engineering; The Effect of Snowmelt and Recharge Dynamics on Rock Weathering in Sagehen Watershed, Sierra Nevada, CA
• Jeser Nij, Penn State UP – Water Resources Engineering; Energy Dissipation and Scour Protection for High Slope Terrains
• Jonathan Fischer, Penn State HB – Civil, Const., and Environmental Engineering; Modeling the Impacts of Storm Intensities and Rainfall Time Increments on Flooding
• Katherine Altamirano, Penn State UP – Department of Ecosystem Science & Management; Assessing for Biogeochemical Hot Spots for Denitrification Across a Heterogeneous Urban Riparian Zone
• Naomi Anderson, Penn State UP – Ecosystem Science and Management; Hierarchical Controls on Stream Intermittency in a Ridge Watershed
• Melinda Marsh, Penn State UP – Ecosystem Science and Management; High-Frequency Nitrate Sensors Show Variable Event Scale C-Q Patterns Across Nested Agricultural Catchments
• Benjamin Castillo, Penn State UP – Civil and Environmental Engineering; Iron-reducing Bacteria (IRB) and Polyphosphate Accumulating Organisms (PAO) Influence Phosphorus Chemical Speciation in Soil Affected by Environmental Disturbances
• Tejal Sudhir, Penn State UP – Ecosystem Science and Management Spatio-temporal Heterogeneity in Snow and Glacier Melt Runoff: Implications for Water Management in the Western Himalayas Transboundary Chenab River Basin
• Helen Senerchia, Penn State UP – Ecosystem Science and Management
  Water Quality Monitoring Network on Halfmoon Creek in Centre County, PA

Penn State Water Initiative Updates

Break

Workshop Session 1 (Sessions 1A, 1B, and 1C will run concurrently)

• Water & One Health: Bridging Environmental and Public Health (1A)
  Water availability and quality present challenges to achieving both public health and environmental objectives. This session is designed to engage researchers and practitioners working on water-related environmental and public health challenges, across the social and natural.
  Moderators: Cheryl Thompson and Asher Rosinger
• Water, Climate & Resilience: Advancing Knowledge and Implementing Innovations to Enhance Resilience in Social-Environmental Systems (1B)
  Climate adaptation necessitates solutions that integrate environmental and social sciences. This session is designed to engage researchers and practitioners concerned with the resilience of environmental and social system interactions and feedback. The session will identify and help advance new ideas, as well as "follow-on" and "build-upon" water-related research for existing and emerging projects such as the Baltimore Social-Environmental Collaborative (BSEC), which addresses adaptation, mitigation, and resilience in urban landscapes. Urban to rural and riverine to coastal systems will be explored across natural and social sciences and engineering.
  Moderators: Lara Fowler and Chris Forest
• Critical Zone Observatory (CZO), Phase 2: Where Next? (1C)
  Years of NSF funding of Penn State's CZO supported an extensive spectrum of water, biogeochemistry, and interdisciplinary research. This research and related data sets provide a foundation for a new phase of work at this densely instrumented, first-order, forested watershed very close to the University Park campus. This session offers faculty from all disciplines the opportunity to learn about the resources available at this unique field research site and generate ideas for new research projects that build upon the CZO resources.
  Moderators: Brandon Forsythe and Ken Davis

Break

Workshop Session 2 (Sessions 2A, 2B, and 2C will run concurrently)

• Water and Health (2A)
  This is a follow-on to session 1A to explore additional detail, new topics identified by participants, and potential partners and funding sources.
  Moderators: Cheryl Thompson and Asher Rosinger
• Chesapeake Basin: Amplifying Penn State Impact (2B)
  There is a long and diverse history of Penn State research and engagement across the Chesapeake Basin, involving countless faculty, staff, and students representing a broad spectrum of disciplines. While these efforts have benefitted Pennsylvania and the region, legacy and emerging challenges call for both new innovations and enhanced coordination to realize full Penn State impact in helping to achieve water-related objectives for environmental and public health and economic vitality, with recognition of diverse social and cultural values across the landscape. This session will build upon ongoing initiatives, such as Pennsylvania in the Balance, to identify opportunities to improve coordination and advance interdisciplinary research and projects that increase Penn State's impact from headwaters to the Bay.
  Moderator: Matt Royer
• Water & Innovation: Materials, Tools, and Technology for 21st Century Water Resource Management (2C)
  Recent technological advances are accelerating transformations in water science and practice. This session is designed to engage researchers and practitioners in advancing technologies for clean water, climate resilience, water-use efficiency and management, observational capabilities, and data-driven/AI and digital twin solutions to water challenges.
  Moderators: Chaopeng Shen and Meng Wang