April 12, 2024

For the second year in a row, a Mizzou Engineering research group snagged an overall first place and a third-place award in the student poster competition at the joint annual meeting of the Missouri Water Works Association (MO-AWWA) and the Missouri Water Environmental Association (MWEA).

Dibya Kanti Datta and Anandu Nair work in Maryam Salehi’s Water and Environmental Research Lab. The research group focuses on fate and transport of microplastics and heavy metals in different environmental systems.

“Water is the world’s most vital resource, and it will take many different ideas and innovations to solve significant challenges around water pollution,” Salehi said. “It’s rewarding to see our contributions to the field being recognized.”

Datta won first overall for his poster outlining the investigation of the deposition and release of lead in plastic drinking water plumbing.

“It was a great honor to win first place in the ‘Fresh Ideas Student Poster Competition’ at 2024 MO-AWWA/MWEA Joint Conference representing the University of Missouri,” he said.

Datta will now represent Mizzou and MO-AWWA at the national AWWA Annual Conference & Exposition (ACE24), being held on June 10-13 in Anaheim, California.

Nair took third place in the Water Track for his poster explaining a new method to identify and measure seven different microplastics in water using Pyrolysis Gas Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry (py-GC/MS) instrument.

The AWWA & MWEA Joint Annual Meeting was held March 24-27 at the Lake of the Ozarks.

Learn more about Salehi’s research here.