Graduate

The specialization in Soil and Watershed Sciences graduate program prepares students to address challenging environmental issues that involve the soil resource at field, landscape and watershed scales.

Soils are the most complex and ecologically significant biogeochemical systems on Earth. Soil processes and the soil resource are critical to all terrestrial ecosystems from prairies to the Alaskan tundra, to wetlands, to our cities, to forests to biofuel farms. Soil Science is at the center of the study of what the National Science Foundation terms the Critical Zone - the confluence of atmosphere, lithosphere, hydrosphere and biosphere near the surface of the Earth.

Soil Science Faculty

	Frank Coale Agricultural Nutrient Management, Soil Fertility, Agroecology fjcoale@umd.edu
	Gary Felton Extension Water Quality Specialist gfelton@umd.edu
	Bob Hill Soil Physics, Soil & Water Management rlh@umd.edu
	Brian Needelman Soil Science (Pedology), Water Quality, Carbon Sequestration bneed@umd.edu
	Masoud Negahban-Azar mnazar@umd.edu
	Mitchell Pavao-Zuckerman Urban Ecosystem Ecology, Ecosystem Services, Social-Ecological Systems, Soil Ecology mpzucker@umd.edu
	Wendy Ann Peer wapeer@umd.edu
	Martin Rabenhorst Pedology, Soils of Wetland Ecosystems, Subaqueous Soils mrabenho@umd.edu
	Gurpal Toor gstoor@umd.edu
	Ray Weil Soil Science, Nutrient Cycling, Sustainable Agriculture Systems rweil@umd.edu
	Stephanie Yarwood Environmental Microbiology syarwood@umd.edu

For more information, contact the Graduate Studies Coordinator

Natalie Lounsbury, ENST graduate student, investigating how cover crops can facilitate notill planting of early spring vegetables. Her future plans are to “combine experience and training in environmental science, farming and social science to develop agricultural practices that benefit farmers, consumers and the environment."

The specialization in Ecological Technology Design prepares students to integrate natural systems with the built environment to solve environmental problems while achieving economic, ecological and social sustainability. The science and application of using natural systems, processes and organisms to address environmental issues has evolved during the last few decades to a mature level whereby there are strong employment opportunities for graduates that are educated jointly in ecology and technology.

Ecological Technology Design Faculty

	Gary Felton Extension Water Quality Specialist gfelton@umd.edu
	Robert Friedel friedel@umd.edu
	Amro Hassanein ahassane@umd.edu
	Jose-Luis Izursa jlizursa@umd.edu
	Pat Kangas Ecological Design, Ecological Engineering, Tropical Ecology and Sustainability pkangas@umd.edu
	Stephanie Lansing Renewable Energy and Ecological Waste Treatment slansing@umd.edu
	Masoud Negahban-Azar Urban Water Resource Management, Graywater and Wastewater Recycling, Natural Treatment Systems, Water-Energy-Food Nexus mnazar@umd.edu
	Mitchell Pavao-Zuckerman Urban Ecosystem Ecology, Ecosystem Services, Social-Ecological Systems, Soil Ecology mpzucker@umd.edu
	David Tilley Ecological Engineering, Wetland Health Assessment, Energy-based Environmental Accounting dtilley@umd.edu

For more information, contact the Graduate Studies Coordinator

A team of 12 talented students from ENST designed a green wall for a solar-powered house, named Watershed, the University of Maryland’s entry into the U.S. Department of Energy’s 2011 Solar Decathlon. Watershed will embrace an ecosystem model and draw inspiration from natural systems, such as the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, which stretches over 64,000 square miles of Maryland, Delaware, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia.

The specialization in Wetland Science addresses the keen awareness among the Environmental community that wetlands represent a critical and understudied component of many larger ecosystems. Hydrophytic vegetation, hydric soils and wetland hydrology all contribute to make wetlands the significant and highly complex ecosystems that they are.

In addition to the more obvious recreational and aesthetic contributions of wetlands, they provide fish and wildlife habitat, protect and enhance water quality through biogeochemical processes, increase flood protection through flood water storage mechanisms, and afford protection against shoreline erosion. Wetlands have rapidly gained public attention over the last two decades as they have been brought into the limelight by state and federal regulations and through the attention given such large scale environmental issues as hurricane Katrina.

Wetland Science Faculty

	Andrew Baldwin Plant Ecology of Natural, Restored, and Treatment Wetlands, Ecological Engineering baldwin@umd.edu
	Patrick Kangas Ecological Design, Ecological Engineering, Tropical Ecology and Sustainability pkangas@umd.edu
	Michael Kearney kearneym@umd.edu
	Brian Needelman Soil Science (Pedology), Water Quality, Carbon Sequestration bneed@umd.edu
	Wendy Ann Peer wapeer@umd.edu
	Martin Rabenhorst Pedology, Soils of Wetland Ecosystems, Subaqueous Soils mrabenho@umd.edu
	Ray Weil Soil Science, Nutrient Cycling, Sustainable Agriculture Systems rweil@umd.edu
	Stephanie Yarwood Environmental Microbiology syarwood@umd.edu

For more information, contact the Graduate Studies Coordinator

ENST graduate student, David Blersch, designs cutting-edge computer system as wastewater treatment method.

The specialization in Ecosystem Health and Natural Resource Management (EHNRM) examines the complex interactions between ecosystem functioning, ecological health, and sustainability from a primarily ecological context.

This program recognizes the shared need within Environmental Science and Human Health communities for an improved understanding of how environmental factors and ecosystem functions affect ecological communities. Integrity of these communities is critical to the continued availability of natural resources and ecosystem services on which we depend. Comprehension of how human activities affect ecosystem functioning allows development of effective “knowledge-based” policy and management tools to mitigate environmental decline and promote sustainable growth and development. 

Ecosystem Health & Natural Resource Management Faculty

	William Bowerman, ENST Department Chair Bald Eagle Ecology, Environmental Pollutants wbowerma@umd.edu
	Gary Felton Extension Water Quality Specialist gfelton@umd.edu
	Reginal Harrell Environmental and Biological Ethics, Physiological Genetics, Stress in Animals, Aquaculture and Phytoremediation, Restoration Ecology rharrell@umd.edu
	Bob Hill Soil Physics, Soil & Water Management rlh@umd.edu
	Jose-Luis Izursa jlizursa@umd.edu
	Paul Leisnham Mosquito Ecology, Global Environmental Change Biology, Human and Ecosystem Health leisnham@umd.edu
	Debasmita Patra dpatra@umd.edu
	Mitchell Pavao-Zuckerman Urban Ecosystem Ecology, Ecosystem Services, Social-Ecological Systems, Soil Ecology mpzucker@umd.edu
	Shannon Pederson shannonp@umd.edu
	Wendy Ann Peer wapeer@umd.edu
	Bob Tjaden Environmental and Natural Resource Management and Policy rtjaden@umd.edu
	Gurpal Toor gstoor@umd.edu
	Lance Yonkos Ecotoxicology lyonkos@umd.edu

For more information, contact the Graduate Studies Coordinator

ENST graduate student, Jennifer Brundage, examines the effectiveness of grazing by goats to control common reed, an invasive wetland grass known as Phragmites australis.