Michigan Tech is a leader in sustainability research. Across nearly all disciplines of the University, faculty and staff are engaged in research related to sustainability in areas as varied as energy systems, food systems, plastics reuse, ecology, and water resource management.
Research Highlight
Dr. David Shonnard (Chemical Engineering) and Dr. Steve Techtmann (Biological Sciences) are leading multidisciplinary teams of researchers to create a second life for waste plastics through circular reuse and conversion to protein powder.
Below find full lists of sustainability researchers and topics, by department, as assembled for our AASHE STARS submission in July of 2020.
| Gretz, Michael R., PHD D | Efficiency Energy extraction from biofuels |
| Hersch-Green, Erika, PHD | Ecological and Evolutionary Genetics |
| Huckins, Casey J., PH | Ecology of lakes and streams |
| Joshi, Chandrashekhar P., PHD | Bioenergy Production |
| Kerfoot, W. Charles, PHD | Aquatic Ecology |
| Marcarelli, Amy M., PHD | Ecosystem Ecology of Streams and Rivers |
| Morin, Brigitte E., MS | Human Nutrition |
| Paterson, Gordon, PHD | Energy dynamics in Great Lakes |
| Tang, Guiliang, PHD | Inactivation of microRNAs in Crop Plants |
| Tang, Mark, PHD | Functional Genomics and Bioinformatics |
| Tang, Xiaoqing, PHD | Obesity, Insulin Production, Secretion, and Signaling |
| Techtmann, Stephen M., PHD | microbial communities for enhanced biofuel production |
| Tumban, Ebenezer, PHD | Vaccine formulations for improved health |
| Werner, Thomas, PHD | Health and Well Being |
| Yu, Chunxiu, PHD | Health and Well Being |
| Rupali Datta | Water quality |
| Vick-Majors, Trista | Water quality |
| Brooks, Colin | Greak Lakes Ecology |
| Andersen, Robert | Water quality |
| Owen, Michael | Herbicide resistant crops |
| Sarkar, Dibyendu | Biogeochemistry in Waste Recycling |
| Stottlemyer, Robert | Environmental Quality |
| Kawatra, S Komar K., PHD | Remediation of chemical and industrial waste |
| King, Julia A., PHD | Thermal and electrical conductivities insulating polymers |
| Minerick, Adrienne | Electrokinetics, medical microdevices, blood cell dynamics |
| Mullins, Michael E., PHD | Catalysis for energy and environmental applications |
| Ong, Rebecca G., PHD | Sustainability of Bioenergy Production Systems |
| Pan, Lei, PHD | Particulate Separation |
| Rogers, Tony N., PHD | Electrical Energy Storage |
| Sandell, John F., PHD | Fire protection and environmental engineering |
| Shonnard, David R., PHD | Life Cycle Analysis/Circular Economy |
| Torrey, Katie S., MS | Quality Education |
| Handler, Robert | Sustainable water and energy systems |
| Agrawal. Pradeep | Pyrolysis and gasification of biomass |
| Caneba, Gerard | Enhanced oil recovery and cleanup operations |
| Eisele, Timothy | Sustainable raw materials production |
| Heldt, Caryn | Health and Well Being |
| Lautala, Pasi T., PHD | Sustainable transportation infrastructure |
| Liu, Leo, PHD | Ground Water Modeling for Geothermal Energy |
| McDonald, Cory P., PHD | Water quality modeling |
| Minakata, Daisuke, PHD | Sustainable water treatment and management |
| Morse, Audra N., PHD | Water and Wastewater Treatment |
| Perlinger, Judith A., PHD | Air and Water Quality |
| Ahlborn, Theresa | Remote Sensing for Bridge Condition Assessment |
| Alkire, Bernie | Effects of cold weather on performance of transportation |
| Artman, Lynn | Lean Construction |
| Aur, Marty | Mathematical modeling of surface water quality |
| Barkdoll, Brian | stream restoration and environmental sustainability. |
| Becker, Jennifer | Bioremediation of Contaminated Groundwater |
| Bulleit, William | Advanced Structural Analysis |
| Chadde-Schumaker, Joan | Great Lakes education and stewardship |
| Colling, Tim | pavement preservation. |
| Dai, Qingli | alternative and sustainable infrastructure materials |
| Dowden, Daniel | Resilient infrastructure |
| Hand, David | Water and Waste Management |
| Hiller, Jacob | Sustainable transportation infrastructure |
| Hutzler, Neil | Water distribution system analysis |
| Leder, William | Sustainable transportation infrastructure |
| Meyer, Alex | Groundwater Remediation Systems |
| Wojcik, Christopher | Greenhouse Gas Monitoring |
| Webster, Veronica | Water resources |
| Wu, Shiliang | Interactions among climate, atmospheric air quality, |
| Ye, Xinyu | Hydrodynamic Models in the Great Lakes |
| You, Zhanping | Recycled materials for civil engineering |
| Zhang, Kuilin | Smart Cities |
| Bos, Jeremy | Autonomous and electric Vehicles |
| Chen, Bo | Battery control for HEV and energy storage systems |
| Hassel, Trever | Hybrid and Electric Vehicle Systems |
| Mork, Bruce | Renewable energy, wind energy, solar energy |
| Oliveira, Aurenice | Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) |
| Pearce, Joshua | Green Engineering: Solar Energy, Sustainable Development |
| Ten, Chee-Wooi | Smart home technologies |
| Jarvie-Eggart, Michelle | Sustainability issues for mining |
| Kemppainen, Amber | Environmental life cycle assessments |
| Thiemann, Kenneth | Water Resources |
| Gierke, John | Ground water Engineering |
| Hinkel. Kenneth | Surface energy exchange as it relates to microclimatology |
| Huntoon, Jacquline | Teacher Education |
| Manser, Nathan | Environmental Consequences of Mining Waste |
| Xi, Xin | Climate and Air quality |
| Hein, Gretchen | Engineering Education |
| Mehendale, Sunil | Alternative energy |
| Drelich, Jaroslaw | Recycling of materials |
| Hackney, Stephen | Lithium ion batteries, ceramic battery materials |
| Hu, Yun Hang | Photocatalysis |
| Heang, Jim | Energy and Recycling |
| Sanders, Paul | Applications in sustainability |
| Sutter, Lawrence | Secondary & Recycled Materials |
| Allen, Jeffrey | Wind Energy, Fuel Cells |
| Bar-Ziv, Ezra | Torrefaction and pyrolysis of Biomass |
| Bigham, Sajjad | Energy Conversion and Storage Devices |
| Endres, William | Reducing waster streams in Manufacturing Processes |
| Ghosh, Susanta | Atomistic Modeling |
| Lee, Seong-Young | Bio/Alternative Renewable Energy and Clean Fuels |
| Miers, Scott | Alternative and renewable fuels |
| Naber, Jeff | Alternative and renewable fuels |
| Ponta, Fernando | Renewable-Energy Sources |
| Ra, Youngchul | Alternative Fuel Research |
| Robinette, Darrell | Hybrid electric propulsion systems |
| Sun, Ye | Human factors |
| Tajiri, Kazuya | Renewable energy |
| Weaver, Wayne | Distributed energy resources |
| Worm, Jeremy | Hybrid Electric Vehicles |
| Green, Sarah | Climate change communication |
| Mazzoleni, Lynn | Identifying organic aerosol constituents from a variety of atmospheric environments |
| Perrine, Kathryn | Li-Ion Battery chemistry |
| Baltensperger, Bradley | Earth Science Education |
| Cooke, William | Exercise Interventions for Obesity, Diabetes, and Hypertension |
| Duncan, Carolyn | Ergonomics and design of built environments for special populations |
| Kamm, Kelly | Social determinants of health |
| Cantrell, Will | Atmospheric Science |
| Fick, Brian | Experimental Astroparticle Physics |
| Kostinski, Alex | Atmospheric Physics |
| Mazzoleni, Claudio | Aerosol properties (optical, physical and morphological) and effects on clouds and climate |
| Shaw, Raymond | Atmospheric Physics |
| Gorman, Hugh | Sustainable energy and environmental policy |
| Halvorsen, Kathy | Climate change mitigation policy |
| Henquinet, Kari | Gender |
| Lafreniere, Don | Environmental Change and Life Course Epidemiology |
| Langston, Nancy | Watershed change and water quality |
| Peters, Susanna | Resource Economics |
| Scarlett, Sarah | Spatial, material, and experiential aspects of social power in industrial communities |
| Schelly, Chelsea | Alternative technology adoption |
| Sidortsov, Roman | Energy and Environmental Policy |
| Wellstead, Adam | Climate Change Adaption |
| Winkler, Richelle | Environmental Sociology and Alternative Energy Adoption |
| Zhou, Shan | Smart Grids, Renewable Energy, Energy Efficiency |
| Gagnon, Valoree | Environmental Justice and Policy, risk management, and promoting holistic health |
| Mayer, Audry | Sustainability science |
| Apriesnig, Jenny | Environmental and Natural Resource Economics |
| Breffle, William | Environmental and Natural Resource Economics |
| Campbell, Gary | Sustainability of mining |
| Connoly, Laura | Economics of Gender |
| Goltz, Sonia | Individual perceptions of group fairness |
| Gupta, Latika | Energy and the Macroeconomy |
| Hong, Soonkwan | Alternative food systems and cultures |
| Johnson, Dean | Investments and Portfolio Management |
| Mukandwal, Prabhjot | Strategic Environmental Sourcing |
| Muralidharan, Daya | Water management and drainage in agriculture |
| Storer, Andrew | Urban forest health |
| Abbots, Hannah | Climate Change |
| Bal, Tara | Forest Health Management and Monitoring |
| Brzeski, Kristin | Noninvasive methods in wildlife management |
| Burton, Andrew | Forest responses to global change factors |
| Busov, Victor | Functional genomics of plant development |
| Cavaleri, Molly | Carbon and water cycling through forests |
| Chimner, Rodney | Peatland and wetland restoration |
| Cotey, Stacey | Watershed management |
| Dickinson, Yvette | Forest restoration |
| Doskey, Paul | Biogeochemistry of Surface-Atmosphere Exchange |
| Eikenberry, Jennifer | Forest ecology |
| Flaspohler, David | Conservation biology |
| Froese, Robert | Biomass and Carbon Inventory, Management, and Life Cycle Assessment |
| Heckman, Katherine | Soil organic matter stabilization, characterization and cycling |
| Hofmeister, Kathryn | Watershed hydrology and biogeochemistry |
| Hoy, Sarah | Animal ecology and conservation |
| Jurgensen, Martin | Global climate change impact on soil biology |
| Kane, Evan | Plant/soil relationships |
| Kulheim, Carsten | Plant adaptation to local environment |
| Kelly, Matthew | Watershed management |
| Laverne, Robert | Environmental, Economic and Social Benefits of Urban Forests |
| Leopold, Patricia | outreach and technical transfer of climate change tools and resources |
| Lilleskov, Erik | Global environmental change impacts on forest ecosystems |
| Liu, Fengjing | Biogeochemistry in snow-dominated, agricultural and forested catchments |
| Marcinkowski, Kailey | Climate change impacts and adaptation |
| Peterson, Rolf | Ecology and behavior of gray wolves |
| Orr, Blair | Forest economics |
| Resh, Segrid | Soil sustainability |
| Rudnicki, Mark | Forest Biomaterials |
| Schmitt, Kristen | Climate change adaptation in natural resource management |
| Vucetich, John | Environmental ethics |
| Jay Meldrum | Alternative Energy |
| Chris Green | Alternative Energy |
| Shuchman, Robert | Water Quality of Inland Lakes |
| Brooks, Colin | Greak Lakes Ecology |
Resources
Energy and Sustainability Research
Household Sustainability: Consuming Food, Energy, Water
NSF Convergence Program MICARES Award
Research on Ecology, Ecosystems, and Environmental Policy
Western UP Food Systems Council