Sunday, March 29, 2009

Water Wiki, NC

Here's information on some of the latest water legislation in North Carolina.

...And here's a link to the main page of the Water Wiki, where you will find the following introduction:

FROM WATER WIKI______________________________________

This website is a place where you can contribute.

How should water be managed in the southeastern United States? This wiki is devoted to discussion and debate of the many facts, issues, opinions and points of view this question raises. Please add your thoughts by registering (it's simple) and writing or editing articles, or by commenting on any of the discussion pages.
~Richard Whisnant, UNC-Chapel Hill; Bill Holman, Duke University

"You cannot step twice into the same river, for fresh waters are flowing in upon you." ~Heraclitus, 500 B.C.
"You cannot click twice into the same water wiki, for fresh data are flowing in upon you." ~An Editor of the Water Wiki, 2007 "
___________________________________________________

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

BAE Faculty, NCSU

Here are four faculty members working in areas I am interested in:

Stream Restoration -
Dr. Greg Jennings

Urban Stormwater Management -
Dr. Bill Hunt

Wetlands -
Dr. Mike Burchell

Nutrient Retention in Surface Waters &
Improving Sampling Techniques -
Dr. Francois Birgand

As you can see from their web sites, they all have interests beyond the short heading I give...

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Graduate School Rankings

NC State compares favorably to other Biological and Agricultural Engineering Graduate Programs.

For this ranking, I eliminated all the factors except:
1. Time to degree
2. Cost
3. Placement Rate (further research or a job)

Click here.

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Water Research Institutes

Each state in the US has a Water Resources Institute. Federal legislation directing water resource research was passed in 1964. Amendments were made in 1978 and then the legislation took its current form, The Water Research and Development Act of 1984. Among other things, the 1984 legislation authorized the creation of Water Resource Research Institutes for each state. The program, commonly referred to as WRRI, is currently administered by the United States Geological Survey (USGS).

In North Carolina, the Water Resources Institute is headquartered at the University of North Carolina. Here's a link.

Institutes for each state are located here.


Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Bowling Green, Purdue, Algae/Cyanobacteria

Bowling Green University and Purdue University have some interesting image libraries for algae and cyanobacteria. The Bowling Green site also has a link to a program that was written to aid in counting specimens in images.

Here they are!

Bowling Green (Image Library and other algal links)

Purdue (Cyanobacteria)

Also, I found this book, written in part by an NC State professor, is availabe at NCSU library. Hopefully I'll be able to check it out the next time I go in.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Algae, Cyanobacteria, and FlowCAM

I found two great books at NCSU library last night.

Detection methods for algae, protozoa and helminths in fresh and drinking water. Chichester, West Sussex, England: John Wiley, 2002.

Cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms state of the science and research needs. Vol. 619. New York: Springer, 2008.

Cyanobacteria is really not a true algae, but acts like one and is commonly referred to as blue-green algae. There are surveys suggesting that half of the Cyanobacteria blooms are toxic. This creates a lot of concern should blooms form in reservoirs that are used for drinking water. Cyanobacteria also can have a negative impact on odor and taste in drinking water. Musty, earthy and stale are common descriptions of these odors and tastes. Efforts are being made to reliably detect the presence of Cyanobacteria as well as associated toxins.

One of the books also refers to this flowcam, for remote analysis of water particles:








There is a bench model and a portable model.

Sample Images