People

Principal Investigator:

Dr. Hull

  • 2023 – Present: Clinical Assistant Professor, Civil Engineering, Boise State University
  • 2023 – Present: Adjunct Assistant Professor, Civil, Environmental, and Geodetic Engineering, The Ohio State University
  • 2018 – 2023: Assistant Professor, Civil, Environmental, and Geodetic Engineering, The Ohio State University
  • Ph.D. Environmental Engineering, University of Colorado Boulder
  • M.S. Civil Engineering with Environmental Specialization, University of Colorado Boulder
  • B.S. Civil Engineering, University of Kentucky

Doctoral Students:

Yijing Liu is a Ph.D. candidate in Dr. Natalie Hull’s lab. She focuses on research related to emerging wastewater treatment technologies (chlorine and UV) and their impacts on microbial communities with a focus on antibiotic resistant bacteria and opportunistic pathogens that are a risk to human health. Yijing is also interested in applying bioinformatic technologies to analyze microbial profiles in lung samples from CF patients with 16s rRNA sequencing, and to analyze metagenomes coupled with corresponding metatranscriptomes in wastewater samples to investigate the gene damage and expression change patterns after UV disinfection.

  • M.S. in Environmental Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, 2017
  • B.S. in Environmental Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, 2016

Daniel Ma is currently pursuing a PhD in Civil Engineering. His goal is to make safe water accessible for underserved communities. Previously, he has conducted performance testing for point of use water treatment products, including hollow fiber membrane filters and ceramic filters. Daniel has also lead his undergraduate engineering team in developing water treatment solutions for communities in Mexico, Nicaragua, and Pakistan, and has traveled overseas to engage in community development work with local organizations. Currently, Daniel’s research focuses on the optimization of UV LED technology for water disinfection and to ensure the long-term effectiveness of UV water disinfection in rural and developing contexts. Other areas of his work involve developing models for quantitative microbial risk assessment to determine long-term microbial safety of drinking water after UV disinfection, aiding in monitoring Ohio wastewater for SARS-CoV-2 during the COVID-19 pandemic, and conducting participatory water quality research in Scioto County, OH to help inform water management and planning in rural Appalachia water systems.

  • M.S. in Civil Engineering, The Ohio State University, 2020
  • B.S. in Engineering with Civil and Environmental Concentrations and Physics Minor, Messiah College, 2019

Amanda Stickney is pursuing a Ph.D. in Environmental Science as a part of the OSU Environmental Science Graduate Program. For her master’s, Amanda studied the impact of relative humidity on fungi’s ability to degrade plastic. As an undergrad, she was involved in environmental chemistry research projects analyzing wood smoke pollution and the impact of road salts on parking lot soils. She also spent a summer at MOTE Marine Laboratory and Aquarium observing the impact of modified clay red tide remediation on blue crabs. Her current research will explore UV as a remediation technique for HABs and their toxins which can negatively impact drinking water, recreation, and environmental quality.

  • M.S. in Environmental Science, The Ohio State University, 2023
  • B.S. in Chemistry with minors in Applied Mathematics, Spanish, and Water Resources, University of Wisconsin – Stevens Point, 2021

Undergraduate Students:

Lilly Des Rosiers is  an undergraduate student studying Environmental Engineering. She is also minoring in Humanitarian Engineering, which fortifies her interests in sustainability and environmental justice. Lilly assists Emma van Dommelen in her master’s thesis to quantify cyanotoxins in drinking water residuals and helps other lab members where it is needed.

 

 

Eunice Kum is an undergraduate student majoring in Microbiology with a keen interest in Environmental Engineering. She will be primarily assisting Amanda in her research on Harmful Algae Bloom treatment with low wavelength. Her research interests include exploring sustainable solutions for environmental problems and studying the microbiological aspects of environmental engineering.

 

Sofia Samangy is an undergraduate student pursuing a degree in Environmental Engineering. She will be assisting Dan with his research of UV technology for water disinfection starting in Summer 2023. Sofia is interesting in pursing research to further her career and to help solve environment engineer and sustainability problems.

 

Alumni:

Judith Straathof earned her Master of Science Environmental Engineering from Delft University of Technology while being a as a visiting scholar with Dr. Natalie Hull as her advisor at The Ohio State University. She earned her B.S. in Earth Sciences with a minor in Engineering Science from The Ohio State University in 2017.  Her research focused on the impact of filter upset on UV disinfection efficacy during conventional surface water treatment. She has presented her research at the AWWA Water Quality Technology Conference in Dallas, TX, the 48th Annual WMAO Conference in Columbus, OH, and was the winner of the OAWWA Virtual Education Summit and was therefore chosen to present at the ACE 2021 Poster Competition. As a research engineer at OSU, she worked on a statewide SARS-CoV-2 monitoring in wastewater project and worked on a project that aimed to mitigate cracking in concrete with bacteria. She also collected wastewater from OSU campus and performed water quality tests. Judith likes rock climbing, running/hiking, and volleyball.

 

Erica Babusci graduated in 2023 with dual BS degrees in Environmental Science and Biology and with a minor in Environmental Engineering. Her interests focus on the intersection between Environmental Engineering and Microbiology. She was a part of the URAP and worked as a research assistant in the Sullivan lab to uncover the genetic determinants in bacteriophage infection. In Dr. Hull’s lab, Erica worked under PhD candidate Yijing Liu to investigate how different morphotypes of nontuberculous mycobacteria are affected by several UV wavelengths. She will also utilize her strong microbiology background to analyze the metagenome post UV light treatment to explore the correlation between UV wavelength and genome and protein damage. After graduation, Erica started as a PhD student at Duke majoring in Environmental Engineering.

 

Emma van Dommelen earned an M.S. in Civil Engineering in 2023 from the Ohio State University. She received her bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from the Ohio State University in 2018 with a distinction in undergraduate research focusing on traffic related pollution through low cost air quality sensors. While in undergrad, Emma traveled to Tanzania with her senior capstone group to gather water quality data necessary for design and construction of a water treatment plant. Her research with Dr. Natalie Hull and public utilities through Hazen and Sawyer focuses on the biodegradation of cyanotoxins in water treatment residuals utilizing indigenous bacteria. Emma was a full time Assistant Engineer at Hazen and Sawyer in Columbus, OH during her and M.S. and continues in that position after earning her M.S. 

 

Sydney Vitt earned her B.S. in environmental engineering with undergraduate research distinction in the fall of 2022. She received a 2021 Undergraduate Research Distinction Scholarship to work under the supervision of Dr. Hull. Her thesis focused on how environmental cyanobacteria, Planktothrix, respond to 222 nm of UV-C light emitted from a KrCl excimer lamp and to 254 nm of light from a low-pressure mercury lamp. After graduation she started as an engineer at AECOM in Akron, OH.

 

 

Jacob Huff is an undergraduate student pursuing a B.S. in Chemical Engineering with a minor in Environmental Engineering. He assisted Dan and Yijing with their projects during the summer of 2022. His work with Dan and Yijing included UV disinfection and preparation of wastewater samples for metagenomic analysis, design and microorganism challenge testing of a water turbine-powered UV LED system to disinfect water, and bench scale experiments with various UV sources to further knowledge of DNA photorepair ability of bacteria.

 

 

Bryant Bergefurd earned a B.S. in Environmental Engineering in 2022.  He assisted with bi-weekly sampling from 3-5 wastewater treatment plants to the Ohio Coronavirus Wastewater Monitoring Network. After graduation, he started as a Civil Engineer at DLZ Consulting in Logan, OH.

 

 

 

David McDonald earned a B.S. in Environmental Engineering with honors research distinction in 2022. He was a 2021 Civil, Environmental, and Geodetic Engineering Undergraduate Summer Research Fellow. His research for his undergraduate thesis compared the inactivation and photorepair of E. coli exposed to 254 nm and 222 nm UV light, emitted by a low-pressure mercury lamp and KrCl excimer lamp, respectively.  After graduation, David started as an engineer at Kimley Horn in Columbus, OH.

 

 

Zanna Leciejewski is from Hudson, Ohio and earned a B.S. in Environmental Engineering with honors research distinction and with a minor in Science, Engineering, and Public Policy in 2021. She received the 2019 College of Engineering Undergraduate Summer Research Program and Undergraduate Research Distinction Scholarships to work under the supervision of Dr. Hull. Her thesis focused on how certain types of algal toxins respond to 222 nm of UV-C light emitted from a novel KrCl excimer lamp and to 254 nm of light from a low-pressure mercury lamp in both laboratory water and filtered natural surface water.  After graduation, Zanna started as an engineer at Hazen and Sawyer in Detroit, MI.

 

Bryan Finneran graduated with a combined J.D./M.S. in Civil Engineering degree at Ohio State in 2020. His research with Dr. Hull focused on the development and testing of an ELISA biosensor for measuring UV-induced viral genome and protein damage.  Bryan earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Cornell University (2015); majoring in Science of Earth Systems with an area of emphasis in Hydrology. At Cornell, he spent 3.5 years performing research in earth and atmospheric sciences -namely hydrology (most of which was through the Cornell Department of Biological and Environmental Engineering, and focused on gathering water quality data for various projects). He also spent several months conducting coastal geography research under Dr. Eugene Farrell of the National University of Ireland Galway. The project he was involved with included an assessment of the Winter 2013/ 2014 coastal storm clusters affecting Ireland, and the subsequent natural recovery of the affected coastal systems.  After graduation, Bryan started as an Associate and Registered Patent Agent at Standley Law Group LLP in Columbus, OH.

Amanda Killian earned a B.S in environmental engineering with research distinction and a music minor in 2020 and is from Dublin, OH. She worked with Dr. Hull’s research group studying microbial community growth for UV light and chlorine disinfection methods for her thesis supported by the College of Engineering Undergraduate Research Distinction Scholarship, and hopes to find new solutions for the disinfection of water to better society. After graduation, Amanda started as a Civil Analyst at Kimley Horn in Raleigh, NC.