Our research is in the general area of environmental microbiology and molecular microbial ecology. We are specifically interested in the microbial species diversity and functional stability of microbial communities. The main objectives are to find novel microibal species for environmental clean-up, to identify fundamental principals governing microbial community dynamics, and to develop models simulating engineered biological systems.
We emphasize on developing tools to characterize complex microbial systems. Modern molecular biology techniques, genetic tools, and environmental genomic methods are integrated with engineering approaches. The particular areas of intersts are:
- Water biological quality: Detection of waterborne pathogens; pathogen environmental survival
- Sewer infrastructure sustainability: New assessment tools for sewer infiltration and inflow, biological markers for sewer problems, sewer systems for public health monitoring.
- Bioremediation of soil/sediment: Identify novel microorganisms capable of degrading persistent organic pollutants in soil/sediment; develop biomolecular markers to monitor bioremediation/natural attenuation
News:
4-30-2012: Cindy Lee successfully defended her M.S. thesis titeled "Chlordane and dieldrin contamination and biodegradation in Ala Wai Canal sediment". Congratulations to Cindy!!!
4-11-2012: Lavane Kim was awarded a two-year graduate fellowship from the U.S. Vinamease Education Foundation (VEF) to continue his PhD study. Congratulations to Lavane!!!
5-26-2011: Jessica Shelton successfully defended her M.S. thesis titeled "Identification of sewage markers for the quantification of the severity of rainfall derived infiltration and inflow". Congratulations to Jessica!!!
5-22-2011: Team America won Hawaii Men's Island Soccer Organization M35+ Spring 2011 Championship (http://www.islandsoccer.com/standings1.htm), and Dr. Tao Yan is a proud member of the team.
10-15-2010: Fan Feng successfully defended her M.S. thesis titled "Partition and survival of fecal indicators between sand and water of beaches in Hawaii ". Congratulations to Fan!!!
8-3-2010: Wendi Zheng successfully defended her M.S. thesis titled "PAH Contamination and Biodegradation Potential in Coastal Stream Sediments on the Island of Oahu, Hawaii" . Congratulations to Wendi!!!
7-27-2010: Our research on reclaimed wastewater irrigation and antibiotic resistance in soil made local news headlines. Listen to the report by Hawaii Public Radio Bytemarks Cafe by Burt Lum and Ryan Ozawa (10:25~13:02) http://www.hawaiipublicradio.org/audio/BMC_072810.mp3.
6-15-2010: Dr. Tao Yan gave invited research speeches on recreational water quality at several Chinese universities, including Tsinghua, Nankai, and the Chinese Academy of Science.
4-22-2010: Dustin Goto successfully defendd his M.S. thesis titled "Concentration Dynamics and Genotypic Diversity of Fecal Indicators in the Manoa Stream Watershed". Congratulations to Dustin!!!
3-18-2010: Dustin Goto won the first-place prize in student research poster competition at the 2010 Hawaii Water Environmental Association conference. Wendi Zheng won the third-place prize.
2-18-2009: Dustin Goto is awarded a NSF EAPSI Fellowship to conduct a two-month summer research at Gwanju Institute of Science and Technology in Korea.
2-5-2009: Fan Feng and Dustin Goto win the first-place and second-place prizes, respectively, in the student poster competition at the 2009 Hawaii Water Environment Association Conference.
6-1-2008: Dustin Goto is awarded a PACE Summer Fellowship to study alternative energy and its commercial viability. The PACE Fellowships were established by the Pacific Asian Center for Entrepreneurship (PACE) at the University of Hawaii to promote scientific and technological innovations.
Last updated on May 28, 2011