Main Discipline:
Main Professional Society:
Affiliations:
- Environmental Engineering
- Association of Environmental Engineering and Sciences Professors (AEESP)
- American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
- Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Wayne State University
Master: Microbiology from Guangxi University China
PhD: Civil Engineering from University of Virginia, Charlottesville
Water and energy are two critical resources inextricable and reciprocally linked: the generation of energy requires large amounts of water, while the treatment and distribution of water are dependent on reliable and low-cost energy. There are significant challenges in providing both clean, affordable water and energy. These challenges include: water and energy resource depletion, high environmental impacts associated with conventional fossil fuels, emerging contaminants in watersheds, etc. Dr. Zhangs research group is interested in tackling these challenges by integrating bioenergy generation and water management for simultaneous production of bio-based energy and water quality improvement in an integrated, strategic manner via a combination of life cycle modeling and targeted laboratory experiments.
Dr. Zhang’s specific research areas include:
• Management of emerging contaminants (microplastics and endocrine disrupting compounds) in natural and engineered water systems;
• Water treatment and water quality;
• Environmental sensor technology and monitoring;
• Renewable bio-energy, especially as pertaining to algal biofuel;
• Integrated bio-energy generation and wastewater treatment;
• Evaluating economic and environmental sustainability of emerging technologies by using life cycle assessment (LCA), life cycle costing (LCC), economic analysis, and system-level optmization and modeling.
Emerging contaminants in the environment, because these contaminants could cause significant risks to ecological and human health yet they are much less studied.