The North Dakota Water Resources Research Institute recently announced its graduate research fellowship recipients for 2015-16. Fellowships ranging from $1,000 to $12,000 were awarded to 16 graduate students – five doctoral and 11 master's students – conducting research in water resources topics at NDSU and the University of North Dakota. 

The fellows, their departments, advisers and research projects are:

• Boonsiri Dandumrongsin, agricultural and biosystems engineering at NDSU, Halis Simsek, "Contribution of Soluble Microbial Products on Dissolved Organic Nitrogen and its Biodegradability in Wastewater Effluent"
• Ryan David, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, Wei Lin, "Water Towers"
• Bryce DeGuise, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, Wei Lin, "Evaluation of Onsite Wastewater Treatment Systems – Sand Filters and Biological Treatment"
• Soklida Hong, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, Eakalak Khan and Sivaguru Jayaraman, "Glutaraldehyde Removal from Flowback and Produced Water Using Photolysis"
• Mohammad Hossain, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, Achintya Bezbaruah, "Biopolymers for Phosphate Removal from Eutrophic Lakes"
• Navaratnam Leelaruban, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, G. Padmanabhan, "A Study of the Spatial and Temporal Characteristics of Drought and its Impact in North Dakota"
• Umma Salma Rashid, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, Achintya Bezbaruah, "Injectable Nanoparticle-based Permeable Reactive Barriers for Groundwater Contaminant Remediation"
• Debjit Roy, ag and biosystems engineering at NDSU, Xinhua Jia, "Snowmelt Water Infiltration into Frozen Soil in the Red River of the North Basin"
• Rebecca Schewe, soil science at NDSU, Francis Casey and Abbey Wick, "Quantifying Soluble Salt Removal from Subsurface Tile-Drain Agricultural Fields"
• Swati Sharma, ag and biosystems engineering at NDSU, Halis Simsek, "UV Light Effect on Bioavailability of Dissolved Organic Nitrogen in a Trickling Filter Process"
• Bahareh Shoghli, earth systems and policy at UND, Howe Lim of civil engineering, "Design Parameters of Embankment Dams in the Upper Midwest in Potential Climate Change Conditions"
• Brent Silvis, earth systems and policy at UND, Haochi Zheng, "Analysis of the Impact of Policy and Economic Drivers of Land-Use Change on Nitrogen Levels of Surface Waters within the Snake, Buffalo and Eastern Wild Rice Subbasins, 2006-2013"
• Jingyi Sun, ag and biosystems engineering at NDSU, Halis Simsek, "Evaluation of Bioavailable Dissolved Organic Nitrogen Using Various Algal Species"
• Mitchell Swanson, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, Eakalak Khan, "The Role of Algal Species on Phosphorus Bioavailability"
• Luisa Torres, civil and environmental engineering at NDSU, Eakalak Khan and Om Yadav of industrial and manufacturing engineering, "Risks of Water Contamination Associated with the Wastewater from Oil Production in the Bakken"
• Anthony Wamono, ag and biosystems engineering at NDSU, Dean Steele, "Effects of Calcium-based Surface Amendments on the Hydraulic Conductivity and Selected Physical Properties of Subsurface Drained Sodic-saline Soils"

A panel of state water resource professionals reviewed the applications and selected the fellows and award amounts. The proposals are prepared by the students with the guidance of their faculty advisers. Regional, state or local collaboration or co-funding is encouraged. The general criteria used for proposal evaluation include: qualifications of the students, scientific merit, originality of research, research related to state or region, and extent of regional, state or local collaboration or co-funding.

Funding for the fellowship program comes primarily from grants provided to the institute by the U.S. Geological Survey and the North Dakota State Water Commission. The institute is one of 54 located at a land-grant institution of each state and territory under the umbrella organization of the National Institutes for Water Resources.

For information, contact Eakalak Khan, institute director and professor of civil engineering at 701-231-7717, or eakalak.khan@ndsu.edu or visit www.ndsu.edu/wrri.