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EPA STAR Grant Awards
Sustainability (5)
Global Change (8)
Aquatic Ecosystems (3)
Endocrine Disruptors (2)
Nanotechnology (9)
Sustainability (5)
Title: Sustainable Lake Management in Maine’s Changing Landscape
Description: The project focuses on the development of sustainable lake management strategies in Maine’ss changing landscape. By providing mechanisms to track and anticipate new residential development and to delineate the impacts of such development on lake ecosystems and their service flows, the proposed research advances scientific understanding and fills significant information gaps. By demonstrating how such information and spatial modeling tools may be used to consider alternative futures, the proposed project also allows for proactive, collaborative management strategies to sustain the quality and enjoyment of Maine lakes.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8403/report/0
Title: Effects of Nanomaterials on Human Blood Coagulation
Description: Transportation policy, a prime shaper of the built environment in metropolitan areas, has historically been guided by the idea of ensuring and improving mobility. But it is accessibility, the capacity to reach destinations, that people seek in a transportation system. Sustainability in transportation and the built environment is furthered by a policy shift from mobility to accessibility as an overarching evaluative framework. This project will support such a shift by developing and estimating—for the first time—measures of accessibility that will enable a meaningful comparison between multiple metropolitan areas of the United States. An outcome of the research will be a new method, in the form of indicators that can be analyzed both within and between regions, by which to gauge the progress of policy on infrastructure and the built environment toward sustainability.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8441/report/0
Title: Partnership for Industrial Ecology in Central Ohio
Description: Despite its promise, industrial ecology (IE) is practiced only sporadically in the U.S. and has not been pursued consistently at a regional scale. Aside from technical and economic challenges, an important barrier is behavioral inertia among industrial firms and consumers. To overcome these challenges, the Partnership for Industrial Ecology in Central Ohio (PIECO) was launched as collaboration between The Ohio State University, the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio, and several regional partners. PIECO’ss mission is to promote a systems approach based on sound science and informed decision-making.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8350/report/0
Title: Protection of Critical Source Areas for Achieving Long-term Sustainability of Water Resources
Description: Urban development and urban sprawl are among the most pressing issues in the United States. Urban development and sprawl impose immediate threats to sustainability of water resources. Although land-use decisions are critical to achieve long-term sustainability of water resources, not every part of landscapes is equally important. Municipalities play a key role in local land-use decision making. The project is to protect and preserve critical source areas at the municipal level for achieving the long-term sustainability of water resources through community-based land-use planning and ordinances.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8442/report/0
Title: Reality Check Plus: Envisioning a Sustainable Maryland
Description: There is widespread consensus, based on a growing body of academic research, that how we design and construct cities has a significant impact on the natural environment. The types of natural systems affected are wide-ranging and include effects on plant and animal habitat, hydrological cycles, air and water quality, and global climate. How to minimize these adverse impacts through sound land-use policy, however, remains under explored. This project explores alternative development scenarios for the state of Maryland and provides estimates of how land development can affect energy consumption and surface water quality.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8445/report/0
Global Change (8)
Title: Impacts of Global Climate and Emissions Changes on U.S. Air Quality (Ozone, Particulate Matter, Mercury) and Projection Uncertainty
Description: The objective of this study is to quantify and understand the impacts and uncertainties of global climate and emission changes from the present to 2050 and 2100 on U.S. air quality, focusing on ozone, particulate matter, and mercury. The original contribution of this research will derive from the application of a unique, state-of-the-art, well-established ensemble modeling system that couples a global climate-chemical transport component with a mesoscale regional climate-air quality component over North America.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8433/report/0
Title: Effects of Global Change on the Atmospheric Mercury Burden and Mercury Sequestration Through Changes in Ecosystem Carbon Pools
Description: Terrestrial carbon (C) pools play an important role in uptake, deposition, sequestration, and emission of atmospheric mercury (Hg). Biomass and soil C pools are highly sensitive to climate and land-use changes with potentially serious consequences for the fate of an estimated 50,000 Mg of atmospheric Hg associated within C pools. The objective is to assess how global change during the next 100 years is likely to affect Hg cycling processes (i.e., atmospheric Hg uptake, sequestration, and emission) associated with vegetation and soil C pools.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8435/report/0
Title: Sensitivity of Heterogeneous Atmospheric Mercury Processes to Climate Change
Description: The goal of the project is to quantify the impact of climate change on key atmospheric processes that control the fate of mercury in transport from emissions to deposition. Efforts will be directed at building on the existing scientific understanding of atmospheric mercury processes by examining the incremental impact of climate change variables on heterogeneous atmospheric mercury processes. An integrated laboratory and modeling approach is employed, building upon laboratory based low-level atmospheric mercury experiments developed under a prior EPA STAR project.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8428/report/0
Title: Effects of Future Emissions and a Changed Climate on Urban Air Quality
Description: The project will focus on the effects of changes in emissions on climate and the resulting feedback of climate change on air quality in Los Angeles, the Central Valley, and Atlanta during the next 50 years. Researchers will examine the effects of emission changes resulting from standard future emission scenarios. Also to be examined are the effects of emission changes due to implementing a future fleet of ethanol-gasoline, plug-in gasoline-electric hybrids, and wind-electrolysis-hydrogen-fuel-cell vehicles.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8429/report/0
Title: Global Change and Air Pollution (GCAP) Phase 2: Implications for U.S. Air Quality and Mercury Deposition of Multiple Climate and Global Emission Scenarios for 2000-2050
Description: The objective of GCAP Phase 2 is to better quantify and understand the effects of global change on air quality and mercury deposition in the United States over the coming decades. As the United States tightens its controls on domestic emissions, we need to determine how external perturbations associated with global change may affect the success of these controls.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8431/report/0
Title: Study the Impact of Global Change on Air Quality Using the Global-Through-Urban Weather Research and Forecast Model with Chemistry
Description: The objectives of this project are to estimate the long-term impacts of global changes on urban and regional air quality over the next 50 years and provide a realistic assessment of those impacts and associated uncertainties using an advanced 3-D model and available observational datasets. Researchers hypothesize that the two-way feedbacks between climate changes and air quality are important in quantifying the impact of global changes on air quality.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8434/report/0
Title: Global and Regional-Scale Models for Ozone, Aerosols and Mercury: Investigation of Present and Future Conditions
Description: The project will use global and regional-scale models for chemistry and transport to investigate the impact of future climate and emissions of air quality in the U.S., with a focus on ozone and mercury.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8355/report/0
Title: Ensemble Analyses of the Impact and Uncertainties of Global Change on Regional Air Quality in the U.S.
Description: This proposal builds on results from a current EPA global change project (RD83830962). The goal is to answer questions, posed from the current project, related to the effects of global change on continental and regional air quality and to include quantitative estimates of uncertainties as part of the answers to the research questions.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8437/report/0
Aquatic Ecosystems (3)
Title: The Impact of Nutrients, Zooplankton, and Temperature on Growth of, and Toxin Production by, Cyanobacteria Blooms in the Upper Reaches of Chesapeake Bay
Description: The frequency and intensity of toxic cyanobacteria blooms has increased in recent decades, causing a plethora of acute, chronic, and fatal illnesses in animals and humans. A clear understanding of factors promoting bloom growth and toxicity has remained elusive, partly because blooms are comprised of toxic and non-toxic strains of the same species which cannot be resolved microscopically. Researchers will utilize quantitative polymerase chain reactions (QPCR) to establish the spatial and temporal dynamics of toxic and non-toxic strains of cyanobacteria and will use reverse transcriptase QPCR to quantify changes in microcystin synthetase gene expression. This project will provide managers with both an enhanced forecast of blooms in this system and information needed to formulate bloom management and prevention strategies.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8378/report/0
Title: Quantifying Grazing on Harmful Algae with a Novel, qPCR-based Technique
Description: The study will develop and apply a novel approach for measuring grazing on harmful algae. Grazing is an important, but poorly constrained, factor in the dynamics of harmful algal blooms (HABs). The new method measures the number of ingested algal cells within grazer gut contents by quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR).
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8377/report/0
Title: The Future of Harmful Algal Blooms: An Empirical Approach to Predicting the Combined Impacts of Rising CO2, Temperature, and Eutrophication
Description: Recent worldwide increases in harmful algal blooms (HABs) are almost certainly linked to cultural eutrophication of coastal environments. Virtually no attention has been given, however, to how other major anthropogenic impacts such as rising CO2 and greenhouse warming could affect HABs. The combination of nutrient enrichment with rapidly increasing “CO2 eutrophication” and warmer water temperatures could provide ideal conditions for the growth of toxic algae over the coming decades. Goals for this project are to evaluate the cumulative impacts of increasing CO2, temperature and nutrients on HAB raphidophytes and dinoflagellates that co-occur in the Delaware Inland Bays (DIB).
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8379/report/0
Endocrine Disruptors (2)
Title: An Integrated Approach to Developing a Total Facility Estrogen Budget at a Swine Farrowing CAFO
Description: Little information is available regarding the concentration, release, fate and transport of estrogenic compounds in animal waste treatment and storage facilities. Naturally occurring estrogens in animal wastes present an emerging risk to terrestrial and aquatic environments through their potential release and action as endocrine disruptors. Given the trend in agriculture toward concentrated animal feeding operations and the extensive volume of waste generated, the potential for environmental impact “cannot be overstated. Large data gaps include: operation specific generation, concentrations and fate of these hormones, their conjugates and metabolites throughout CAFO facilities. Specifically, little data has been generated evaluating estrogen loads from differing swine operations such as farrowing and finishing facilities. To address these data gaps we shall focus on a swine farrowing CAFO based on its operational units.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8423/report/0
Title: Fate of Hormones in Waste from Concentrated Broiler Feeding Operations
Description: A subset of broiler litter samples received by the Agricultural and Environmental Services Laboratory of the University of Georgia will be divided into different classes, and hormone concentrations in each class will be determined. Broiler litter in five stack houses will be sampled at the beginning and end of a storage period to determine the dynamics of hormone concentrations during storage. Information on hormone concentration in different classes of broiler litter and at different broiler litter storage times will be useful to determine where research efforts should be concentrated to reduce hormone concentrations. Information on transport and decomposition of hormones in broiler litter placed on the soil surface would allow a better assessment of the risk of contaminating ground and surface waters with hormones in grasslands fertilized with broiler litter. Information on the effect of grassland aeration will be useful to determine if this practice should be used to reduce contamination of surface runoff with hormones derived from broiler litter.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8422/report/0
Nanotechnology (9)
Title: Photochemical Fate of Manufactured Carbon Nanomaterials in the Aquatic Environment
Description: The objective of the proposed research is to investigate photochemical transformation of buckminsterfullerene (C60) and single wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) under conditions of environmental relevance. Due to the strong light absorbance of these materials within the solar spectrum, photochemical transformation in the environment may lead to potentially more water soluble and easily bioaccumulative products.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8404/report/0
Title: The Fate and Effects of Nanosized Metal Particles along a Simulated Terrestrial Food Chain Investigated Using Genomic and Microscopic Techniques
Description: This project will investigate interactions between nanoparticle size and chemical composition for 5 and 100 nm Cu, Ag, and Au nanoparticles in determining bioavailability, tissue distribution and toxicity in a simulated terrestrial food chain consisting of soil, earthworms (Eisenia fetida), and bullfrogs (Rana catesbeiana).
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8374/report/0
Title: Effects of Ingested Nanoparticles on Gene Regulation in the Colon
Description: Researchers will test the hypothesis that ingested nanoparticles are taken up by inflamed colon cells, transferred to the nucleus, and are the cause of alteration of gene transcription. Colon cancer is a major cause of death, and any environmental agent that causes increased colon inflammation or affects the regulation of cell cycle genes is a logical concern. The goal of this toxicology study will be to quantify the ability of a suite of manufactured nanoparticles to affect inflamed versus non-inflamed colon cells and to elucidate the biochemical mechanisms linking particles to changes in gene regulation.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8373/report/0
Title: Biological Fate & Electron Microscopy Detection of Nanoparticles During Wastewater Treatment
Description: The market for nanomaterials is increasing rapidly, and nanoparticles (NPs) present in consumer products, industrial wastes, and biomedical applications, will become significant in the near future for wastewater treatment just as nutrients, pathogens, metals, and synthetic organic chemicals have been important for the last few decades. The goal of this project is to quantify interactions between manufactured NPs and waste water biosolids
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8402/report/0
Title: Nanoparticle Stability in Natural Waters and its Implication for Metal Toxicity to Water Column and Benthic Organisms
Description: The project will test the hypothesis that metal-containing manufactured nanomaterials pose an exposure and toxicological risk to aquatic organisms. The toxic ‘species’ may be the nanoparticle or dissolved metal ions liberated following (partial) dissolution. Researchers propose to address three objectives in this research: 1) determine the stability (against aggregation and dissolution) of nanoparticles as a function of water composition; 2) determine the uptake, distribution, and elimination of metals from dissolved and nanoparticle phases within Daphnia magna organisms under variable water compositions; and 3) determine the uptake, distribution, and elimination of metals from dissolved and aggregated nanoparticle phases within Hyalella azteca organisms under variable water compositions.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8375/report/0
Title: Aquatic Toxicity of Carbon-Based Nanomaterials at Sediment-Water Interfaces
Description: Objectives of the study are to investigate toxicity of carbon-based one-dimensional nanomaterials toward aquatic organisms that inhabit sediment-water interfaces and to identify factors controlling the toxicity to sediment-dwelling organisms. There is little doubt that some of these manufactured nanomaterials will be released into the environment. Our knowledge on their environmental impact, however, is extremely limited. This project’ss goal is elucidation of whether the interaction between heavy metals and carbon-based nanomaterials will neutralize or promote the aquatic toxicity or have no effect.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8372/report/0
Title: The Effect of Surface Coatings on the Environmental and Microbial Fate of Nanoiron and Feoxide Nanoparticles
Description: Responsible use of manufactured nanomaterials in environmental applications (e.g. nanoiron) and prudent management of the associated risks requires a fundamental understanding of their mobility, bioavailability, and impacts on a wide variety of organisms. The study objectives are to determine the effect of common NP surface coatings on nanoiron reactivity, mobility, fate, and effect on soil bacteria.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8443/report/0
Title: Impact of Physiochemical Properties on Skin Absorption of Manufactured Nanomaterials
Description: The wide applications of manufactured nanomaterials will create enormous potential for human exposure and environmental release. Skin, as the largest organ protecting the body from exogenous toxins and particulates, will be a major portal of entry for nanomaterials. A preliminary study has shown that fullerene nanoparticles can penetrate deep into the stratum corneum (the primary barrier of the skin) and be modulated by solvents and ion-pairing agents. The objective of this project is to establish a structure-permeability relationship for skin absorption of manufactured nanomaterials for safety evaluation and risk assessment.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8444/report/0
Title: Ecotoxicology of Underivatized Fullerenes (C60) in Fish
Description: Use of nanomaterials (e.g., C60 fullerenes) in various industries is projected to increase dramatically in the future and environmental contamination by these materials is expected. Aquatic ecosystems are likely to become contaminated by C60 in the future and the potential for toxicity in aquatic organisms should be investigated. The objectives of the study are to investigate characteristics of aqueous C60 aggregates, the impact of dissolved organic material on behavior of these aggregates, and to evaluate bioavailability and toxicity of C60 in fish by assessing changes in gene expression, histopathology, and bioaccumulation of C60 in tissues.
Website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncer_abstracts/index.cfm/fuseaction/display.abstractDetail/abstract/8446/report/0