Vikesland Research Group

2019

June - Dr. Vikesland will give a Keynote Presentation at the 5th Environmental Dimension of Antibiotic Resistance (EDAR 5) Conference in Hong Kong, China. The presentation will highlight all of the great work being conducted across our NSF PIRE Project Halting Environmental Antimicrobial Resistance Dissemination (HEARD).

June - Dr. Vikesland will give an invited platform presentation at the Environmental Nanotechnology Gordon Conference held at the Jordan Hotel at Sunday Rivert in Newry, Maine.

May - Ayella attended the workshop 'Environmental DNA Methods: QIIME 2 Software Training' held at UTC SimCenter in Chattanooga, TN.

May - Dr. Vikesland, Dr. Pruden, Emily, Dongjuan, Mariah, and Suraj all attended the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP) biennial meeting held at Arizona State University. At the meeting, former Vikesland group member Haoran Wei was awarded the Jacobs Engineering Group/AEESP Best Disseration Award. Congrats to Haoran!

April - Dr. Vikesland attended the retirement party for his PhD advisor Dr. Richard Valentine at the University of Iowa. Congrats to Rich on a great career and thanks for all of the great wisdom and guidance over many years!

March - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited presentation at the Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics at Duke University. Thanks to evryone at FIP for the intellectually stimulating visit!

January - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited presentation at the Nano-Enabled Water Technologies conference held at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia. Thank you to Dr. Peng Wang for the invitiaton and for hosting!

 

2018

November - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited presentation in the Amgen Seminar series organized by the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Rhode Island.  Thanks to Dr. Geoff Bothun for the invitation!

October - Dr. Vikesland joined the other members of the ES:Nano Editorial Board for the annual journal Board meeting.. This was held in conjuction with a symposium on 'Future perspectives on environmental nanotechnology' at Burlington House in London.

October - Dr. Vikesland attended the AEESP meet and greet held during WEFTEC in New Orleans. Dr. Vikesland received the inaugural Walter J. Weber Frontier in Research Award from AEESP.

October - Dr. Vikesland joined Dr. Pruden, Ayella, Matt B., Ishi, and Emily in beautiful Ascona, Switzerland for the Halting Antimicrobial Resistance Dissemination in Aquatic Environments (HEARD2018) conference co-organized by Dr. Vikesland, Dr. Pruden, and our colleagues Helmut Bürgmann (EAWAG) and Celia Manaia (Universidade Catolica Portuguesa, Portugal).

May - Dr. Vikesland gave a Keynote Presentation and a contributed Presentation at the International Water Association Leading Edge Technology Conference held in Nanjing, China

May - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited seminar at the School of Environment and Energy of the South China University of Technology in Guangzhou, China. Thanks to  Zhang Lin for the invitation and for hosting!

May - Dr. Vikesland gave a Keynote Presentation at the 4th International Conference on Environmental Pollution and Health held at Nankai University in Tianjin, China.

May - Suraj Gupta successfully defended his M.S. Thesis 'Metagenomic Data Analysis Using Extremely Randomized Tree Algorithm'. This collaborative HEARD-PIRE effort was aided by the expert advice of Gustavo Arogoty (Zhang Group), Dr. Liqing Zhang, and Dr. Pruden.

May - Our collaborative paper with Amy Pruden and a number of AEESP colleagues 'An Environmental Science and Engineering Framework for Combating Antimicrobial Resistance' was published by Environmental Engineering Science.

April - Hossein Abtahi successfully defended his Ph.D. Dissertation entitled 'Implications of Shape Factors on Fate, Uptake, and Nanotoxicity of Gold Nanomaterials.' Congrats Hossein!

April - Dr. Vikesland was named the Nick Prillaman Professor in Engineering by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors.

March - Our 2017 Feature Article 'Toward a Comprehensive Strategy to Mitigate Dissemination of Environmental Sources of Antibiotic Resistance' was selected by ES&T as the First Runner Up Best Feature article of 2017.

March - Dr. Vikesland, Matt, and Mariah attended the American Chemical Society Meeting in New Orleans, LA. At the meeting, Dr. Vikesland co-organized a symposium entitled Antibiotics & Antimicrobial Resistance: Developing Solutions to Address the Connectivity Between Air, Food, Water, and Soil with HEARD-PIRE colleagues Amy Pruden and Xiang-Dong Li.

March - Marjorie Willner successfully defended her Ph.D. Dissertation entitled 'Environmental Analysis at the Nanoscale: From Sensor Development to Full Scale Data Processing'.  Congrats Marjorie!

January - Jake Metch's  article "Metagenomic Analysis of Microbial Communities Yields Insight into Impacts of Nanoparticle Design" was published in Nature Nanotechnology. This was the culmination of a collaborative effort between the Vikesland and Pruden groups at Virginia Tech and the group of Cathy Murphy at the University of Illinois. The paper was highlighted in an editorial written by the Editor-in-Chief of Nature Nanotechnology.

January - Haoran Wei successfully defended his Ph.D. Dissertation entitled 'Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy for Environmental Analysis - Optimization and Quantitation'. Immediately after defending, Haoran started work as a post-doc in Jaehong Kim's research group at Yale University. Congrats Haoran!

January - Dr. Vikesland was named the Editor-in-Chief of the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Environmental Science: Nano.

2017

December - Dr. Vikesland and family returned from their six month stay in Zurich. Thanks to Kris and Michi for hosting us!

December - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited seminar at the Department of Environmental Geosciences at the University of Vienna. Thank you to Thilo Hofmann for the invitation and the opportunity to visit the beautiful city of Vienna.

October - Our HEARD-PIRE collaborative Feature Article 'Toward a Comprehensive Strategy to Mitigate Dissemination of Environmental Sources of Antibiotic Resistance' was published by ES&T.

September - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited seminar at EAWAG. Thanks to Janet Hering for the kind invitation and to Tim Julian for hosting!

August - Dr. Vikesland attended the Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy Faraday Discussion held at Strathclyde University in Glasgow, Scotland.

August - Dr. Vikesland, Suraj, Ayella, Mariah, Virginia, Dr. Pruden,  the Pruden Group members Ishi and Emily, Dr. Zhang, and Gustavo (Zhang Group) all represented the HEARD PIRE at the 4th Environmental Dimension of Antibiotic Resistance Conference at Michigan State in East Lansing, MI.

August - Ayella Maile-Moskowitz joined the group as a new PhD student. Ayella come to us from the University of Maryland. Ayella is supported by a NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. Welcome Ayella!!

July - Dr. Vikesland and his family embarked on a six month sabbatical at ETH-Zurich. Dr. Vikesland was hosted in Zurich by Dr. Kris McNeill and Dr. Michael Sander.

June - Dr. Vikesland concluded his tenure as the AEESP President while attending the AEESP Biennial meeting in Ann Arbor, MI.

May - Dr. Vikesland and Dr. Characklis from UNC-Chapel Hill gave a presentation to the Grand Challenges and Opportunities in Environmental Engineering for the 21st Century National Academies Study Committee. This presentation provided highlights of what was learned from the AEESP-NSF workshops held in 2016.

April - Dr. Vikesland, Matt, Chang, Haoran, and Marjorie all gave presentations at the American Chemical Society Meeting held in San Francisco, CA. Great job everyone!

March - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited seminar at the Department of Environmental Science at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. Thanks to Bryan Brooks for the kind invitation!

March - Dr. Vikesland attended the NanoImpact conference at Monte Veria, Switzerland.

March - Dr. Vikesland and other members of the HEARD PIRE team met at Rice University to discuss research collaborations.

February - Dr. Vikesland attended the AEESP Board of Directors meeting held at the University of South Florida Marine Science Campus in St. Petersburg, FL.

January - Dr. Vikesland began his year long sabbatical.

2016

November - Dr. Vikesland and Dr. Pruden traveled to Hong Kong and Xiamen, China to meet with HEARD PIRE collaborators Tong Zhang, Xiangdong Li, and Yong Guan Zhu.

September - Dr. Vikesland began his term as the President of AEESP and represented the organization at the Water Environment Federation Annual Conference WEFTEC in New Orleans, LA

September - Dr. Vikesland and Haoran attended the SCIx Conference held in Minneapolis, MN.

September - Dr. Vikesland attended the AEESP Board of Directors Meeting held at Ohio State University.

August - Dr. Vikesland gave an invited seminar at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh. Thanks to Leanne Gilbertson for the kind invitation!

June - Dr. Vikesland and Marjorie attended the Environmental Sciences: Water Gordon Research Conference at the Holderness School in New Hampshire.

May - Dr. Vikesland hosted and was the co-organizer of the AEESP-NSF Workshop on the Grand Challenges in Environmental Enginering held at the the Arlington, VA campus of Virginia Tech. The final report from this workshop is available on the AEESP webpage.

May - Alex Flint successfully defended his MS degree. Congrats Alex!

April - VTSuN members Haoran, Hossein, and Nina Vance all attended the U.S. Science and Engineering Festival in Washington D.C. and managed a booth introducing people to Sustainable Nanotechnology.

March - Dr. Vikesland was the co-organizer of the AEESP-NSF Workshop on the Grand Challenges in Environmental Enginering held at the Rice University.

March - Dr. Vikesland along with Virginia, Jake Metch, and Dr. Pruden all attended the kickoff meeting for our NSF sponsored PIRE project 'Halting Environmental Antimicrobial Resistance Dissemination' Project at IIT-Madras in Chennai, India.

March - Weinan, Haoran, and Matt C. each gave presentations at the Spring 2016 ACS Meeting in San Diego, CA.

February - Dr. Vikesland attended the Royal Society of Chemistry Editor's Symposium in London, UK.

February - Dr. Vikesland attended the Spring 2016 AEESP Board of Directors Meeting held at UNC-Chapel Hill

January - Dr. Vikesland was the co-organizer of the AEESP-NSF Workshop on the Grand Challenges in Environmental Enginering held at the University of Southern California.

2015

November - Dr. Vikesland along with Marjorie, Virginia, Haoran and Hochella group member James Dale all represented  VTSuN at the 2015 Sustainable Nanotechnology Organization Meeting in Portland, OR. At the conference, Marjorie was the 3rd place awardee for her optofluidic elevator pitch. Congrats to Marjorie!

October - Dr. Vikesland attended the Nanotechnology and Food-Energy-Water Nexus Workshop at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA.

September - Marjorie gave a well-received presentation on her optofluidic experiments at the SciX conference in Providence, RI.

August - Dr. Vikesland gave a presentation on aspects of Param's Ph.D. dissertation at the Fall 2015 ACS Meeting in Boston, MA.

August - Paramjeet Pati successfully defended his Ph.D. dissertation. Param is now working as a Professor of Practice at Smith College in MA. Congrats Param!

July - Dr. Vikesland and Matt C. visited  the CEREGE laboratories in Aix-en-Provence. Thanks to Jerome, Jean-Yves, and everyone else for the great hospitality!

June - Dr. Vikesland and group members Haoran, Marjorie, Param, and Matt C. all attended the Biennial Meeting of the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP) at Yale University.

June - Ronald Kent successfully defended his Ph.D. dissertation. Ron is now working as a consulting engineer with Geosyntec Consultants. Congrats Ron!

March - Dr. Vikesland represented VTSuN at the SUN-SNO-GuideNano Conference in Venice, Italy. Dr. Vikesland chaired the Nanotechnology Education session.

February - Dr. Vikesland and the other members of the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP) Board of Directors toured the Tampa Bay Water Desalination Plant. Thanks to Tim Ware (American Water) and Suzannah Folsom (Tampa Bay Water) for being such great hosts! Photos from the tour that document the use of RO for saltwater desalination can be found here.

January - Dr. Vikesland attended the first editorial board meeting of the new Royal Society of Chemistry Journal Environmental Science: Water Research and Technology. A blog post and photo commemorating the event can be found here.

January - Param received an ACS Division of Environmental Chemistry Graduate Student Award. Congrats Param!

January - Chang Liu and Alex Flint (BS Virginia Military Institute) joined our research group as new Ph.D. and M.S. students, respectively. Welcome!