Livingstone Undergraduate Research Award in STEM
Livingstone Undergraduate Research Award in STEM
Willow Neske
Bioretention Systems Optimized for Denitrification: Stormwater Management Practice Design Recommendations for Philadelphia
View Willow’s project online
My project proposes bioretention system design features for land developers in the Philadelphia area, focusing on the inclusion of an internal water storage layer and the use of biochar as a media amendment for the system. Bioretention systems are basins engineered with different soil media layers to control stormwater runoff flow and remove inorganic nutrients and metals. My proposal suggests that bioretention systems with biochar amended soil and IWS layers are expected to mitigate higher concentrations of pollutants and higher volumes of water, which prevents polluted runoff from overwhelming Philadelphia’s combined sewer systems and local aquatic ecosystems.
What is your major and expected year of graduation?
I am a bioengineering major expected to graduate in 2023.
What inspired you to pursue your project?
While I am a bioengineering major, I am also pursuing a minor in environmental engineering because I am interested in researching microbial processes, especially in engineered systems.
In 2021, I was working in Dr. McKenzie’s Environmental Engineering Research lab, testing how copper pollution affects microbial denitrification in bioretention systems designed with or without sorbent biochar media and an internal water storage layer. Then, in the fall of 2021, I took Dr. Keston’s technical communication course. The major course paper was a partial proposal for an engineering solution to a problem based on literary findings. I decided that I wanted to expand upon my knowledge of bioretention system design that I had gained while working in Dr. McKenzie’s lab by researching bioretention system design features and writing a proposal that would focus on optimizing microbial denitrification in bioretention systems built in urban areas that experience high metal and nitrogen pollution loads and flooding.
What does winning this award mean to you?
I am honored that Temple University Libraries has chosen me to receive this award. As I move on to graduate school, I will continue to be grateful for the financial support and resources Temple Libraries have provided me.
How did the Libraries support your research?
As a bioengineering major, most of my experience with researching information prior to writing my engineering proposal pertained to bioengineering topics. Temple University Libraries’ website features several research guide web pages, including a “Civil and environmental engineering” research guide. I used this guide to find articles, design manuals, and textbooks to fill in the gap in my understanding of bioretention systems.
Researchers in engineering face two challenges: to solve an immediate problem in a particular context and to more broadly contribute to the field. Drawing from a wide range of scholarly sources, strategically supplemented with commercial and municipal documents, Willow Neske meets both goals, proposing a solution that the Philadelphia Water Department could implement now to protect the local environment and that other cities and researchers could use as a template for future work. In the months over which she completed her project, Willow asked hard questions about her own assumptions and continually rethought her ideas, crafting a paper that clearly walks readers through the process of analyzing alternative solutions and choosing the best fit.
—Geoff Keston, Adjunct Assistant Professor, College of Engineering
This category covers research methods used in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. For the sciences, submissions will include a review of the relevant literature and a description of experimental results obtained through the scientific method. Technology and engineering submissions may take the form of a technical report or design document.
This award is generously sponsored by John H. Livingstone, SBM ’49.