Young-Shin Jun, professor of energy, environmental and chemical engineering at the McKelvey School of Engineering, has received an $800,486 three-year grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to develop novel mineral-hydrogel composites that can effectively remove nutrients to manage harmful algal blooms. For this project, Jun will collaborate with Yinjie Tang, also professor of energy, environmental and chemical engineering at the McKelvey School of Engineering, in conducting both benchtop and pilot-scale tests of the composites’ ability to control noxious algal growth.
The composites developed will be the key to a robust, environmentally sustainable and widely applicable nutrient removal/recovery technology that reduces exponentially growing algal blooms driven by excess nutrients in water. In addition, the composites capture phosphorous and nitrogen that can be beneficially used as fertilizer, which supports a sound circular economy.
