Recipient Organization
UNIV OF IDAHO
875 PERIMETER DRIVE
MOSCOW,ID 83844-9803
Performing Department
School of Food Science
Non Technical Summary
Water Treatment Technology InnovationIntensification of resource recovery is a global prime mandate for sustainability. The trajectory of increasing population and increasing resource demand for water and food security create an innovation imperative for sustainability in the context of the Food-Energy-Water nexus. Addressing this innovation imperative requires transdisciplinary thinking, creative systems approaches, and translational research products that address the grand challenges of our shared future.We will be developing new appraches to water reuse and recycling that focus on nutrient phosporus and nitrogen recovery from wastewater as well as the destrucive removal of pathogens and contaminants.This work will accelerate the capacity of the US to meet near-term and future water needs by developing an understanding of alternatives to wastewater treatment where nutrients, energy and water resources are recovered and reused. There is a need for scalable technology that advances water reuse and recycling, bioenergy and carbon sequestration, as well as nutrient recovery and aquatic pollution mitigation.The future of food security needs, non-renewable nutrient resources, pollution mitigation and an enhanced regulatory framework increases the need for new approaches to water quality and nutrient management. The basic technology approach applies biochar, ozone and metal salts to wastewater. We call this Biochar Water Treatment technology N-E-W Tech™ and the nutrient upcycled biochar fertilizer product of the process, N-E-W Terra™.Biochar is a charcoal product made from agricultural or forestry biomass bioenergy processes and has been shown to have positive productivity impacts as a soil amendment in most agricultural applications. However, the current value proposition of biochar as a soil amendment to increase yield within most crop systems is not yet considered profitable.One way to increase the value of biochar is to add phosphorus and nitrogen, such as in our "Moo Terra™," an upcycled biochar manufactured from dairy waste streams and the biocarbon residual from bioenergy production. We anticipate that Moo Terra™ advances four value-added benefits: 1) physical improvements to soil (e.g., water holding capacity); 2) addition of plant nutrients; 3) slow release of nutrients; and 4) addition of soil carbon, which improves soil properties such as cation exchange, in addition to its role as a long term carbon sink helping in the global carbon balance.The increased benefits of Moo Terra™ will make it attractive for agricultural industry and the marketplace. These properties suggest biochar can be the basis of an enhanced efficiency fertilizer, a major fertilizer industry target for product innovation.Depending on surface chemistry, biochar can be engineered to adsorb N and P compounds, thus presenting it as a vehicle for recovering nutrients from waste flows in wastewater treatment or engineering a fertilizer de novo using targeted commodity N/P formulations added to the reactive biochar. Our work will attempt to precisely engineer a Moo Terra™ fertilizer product that addresses many agricultural and horticultural applications and a wide variety of nutrient resources.Nutrient upcycled biochar presents advantages in retail and wholesale soil amendment and fertilizer product development due to the direct and indirect agronomic impacts and shared social value accompanying the use of biochar (e.g., nutrient pollution management, soil quality, and climate change mitigation). Biochar soil building products have had a limited impact so far in production agriculture due to high costs in large-scale field application and challenges to extrapolate the positive findings of controlled research studies into value for an already economically stressed agricultural economy. However, the value prospectus of adding nutrients to biochar to yield an enhanced efficiency fertilizer (EEF) may accelerate biochar use, realizing the agricultural production advantages of an EEF that maintains nutrients in the rhizosphere and reduces run-off and groundwater leaching.The tangible attributes of nutrient upcycled biochars, biomass energy and recycled water can address some of the great challenges of humankind while increasing yields, mitigating climate change and addressing oversubscribed water resources. Thus this work can have positive direct and indirect impacts on agricultural success, economic development, carbon management, food security and leadership in sustainability.Teaching InnovationThe anytime, anyplace dynamic of the Web is powerful and can advance accessibility. However, scaling any course beyond a small number of students has risks and benefits. When a class exceeds about 15 students, live or online, communication and interaction becomes more challenging. From the beginning education researchers have advanced user-interface colors that support good communication, camera eye contact and high-touch individual student accessibility and follow-up. A move from synchronous course activity because of the time challenges of most online students, directs the design of reflective discussion prompts that leverage class size for student diversity -- be it experiential, belief and value systems, academic focus, or geographical.Our new courseware development is based on many dynamics including efficient ed-tech tools and our increasing understanding of the cognitive neuroscience of learning and memory, where sounds and imagery help us in high cognitive load environments. With ear-to-ear spatial sound that I engineer for headphones, the 3D surround-sound doculectures let an instructor "walk inside the brain" of students in an information intense presentation, using location ambient sounds, music, and voice. This allows for an intimate learning experience that emotes warmth and caring about the subject matter, and thus an openness in attitude to assimilation and deeper learning. Related research supports this approach, specifically:• Learning is aided by slow, soft, repetitive music• Music soundtracks influence interpretation, emotion, and remembering in film• Cognition and emotion are critically linked; mood induction by music can enhance empathy• Our understanding of emotion in higher cognition is active area of study• Cognitive disfluency (challenges that make you focus) leads to deeper processingFor the courseware development of FS 409/509 Principles of Environmental Toxicology (ETox) and FS 464/564 Food Toxicology (FoodTox), we are developing advanced animation to help illustrate the anatomy and physiology of toxicology. This will be accomplished using advanced biomedical animation constructs that allow for 3D human anatomy visualization down to the organelle level.The FoodTox and ETox courses will be produced in a new PowerPoint-free doculecture format, using advanced animation tools. In what I call "Pixar to Pedagogy", I am using full-size, high-resolution 3D male and female digital medical anatomy characters that can physically interact and even talk with me during a filmed lecture. All of my courses are available on computers, smartphones, video game consoles, streaming media players, and internet protocol TV. The Creative Commons 3.0 licensed course materials are produced with permissioned royalty-free content, and loaded about 2000 times per week in 80+ countries. My courses are a working, successful example of next generation, global and mobile learning possibilities in higher education -- without compromising the social dynamic of small group affinity learning.
Animal Health Component
0%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
20%
Applied
80%
Developmental
(N/A)
Goals / Objectives
The GOAL of this proposed technology innovation for water reuse and nutrient N/P resource recovery research is to advance new technologies and new knowledge of the molecular mechanisms of binding and recovery of phosphorus and nitrogen species on metal salt and functionalized biochar in a novel catalytic oxidation--reactive filtration wastewater treatment process. The GOAL for innovations in teaching toxicology is to advance the quality of online and digitally enhanced teaching through application of advanced media and 3D surround-sound digital production for the classroom.The OBJECTIVES of this work are:Explore high flow approaches to treating nutrient laden wastewaters to recover and recycle phosphorus on biochar substrates for enhanced efficiency fertilizer and carbon sequestration [Water Technology Goal].Explore high flow approaches to treating nutrient laden wastewaters to recover and recycle fixed nitrogen on biochar substrates for enhanced efficiency fertilizer and carbon sequestration [Water Technology Goal].Apply a catalytic oxidation technology that advances destructive removal of pathogens and contaminants in wastewaters [Water Technology Goal].Develop new and economical treatment approaches to reclaiming, recovering and recycling degraded waters for unrestricted reuse [Water Technology Goal].Advance collaborations with researchers and industrial partners that work in related areas [Technology Goal].Apply new media including advanced 3D animation techniques and documentary film style production to courseware development in toxicology [Teaching Innovation Goal].
Project Methods
Objective 1) Recover and recycle phosphorus. Explore through scientific study, the binding of P compounds on biocarbon substrates. Engineer processes and operations to treat nutrient laden wastewaters to recover P in a form suitable for cost effective and efficacious reuse.Efforts- Deliver science-based knowledge through formal or informal publication/presentation and educational programs including formal classroom instruction, student research experiences, extension and outreach.Evaluation- Measurement of percent recovered P from wastewaters. Cost and process efficiency for P removal and recycling for reuse. Patents applied for and patents issued. Licenses of technology by industry. Number of formal and informal publications and presentations.Objective 2) Recover and recycle fixed nitrogen. Deliver science-based knowledge through formal or informal educational programs including formal classroom instruction, student research experiences, extension and outreach. the binding of N compounds on biocarbon substrates. Engineer processes and operations to treat nutrient laden wastewaters to recover fixed N in a form suitable for cost effective and efficacious reuse.Efforts- Deliver science-based knowledge through formal or informal publication/presentation and educational programs including formal classroom instruction, student research experiences, extension and outreach.Evaluation- Measurement of percent recovered N from wastewaters. Cost and process efficiency for N removal and recycling for reuse. Patents applied for and patents issued. Licenses of technology by industry. Number of formal and informal publications and presentations.Objective 3) Apply catalytic oxidation. Explore through scientific study and engineering design, new approaches to oxidatively destroy pathogens and contaminants of concern in wastewaters.Efforts- Deliver science-based knowledge through formal or informal publication/presentation and educational programs including formal classroom instruction, student research experiences, extension and outreach.Evaluation- Measurement of pathogens and contaminants destructively removed from wastewaters. Cost and process efficiency for removal and water recycling for unrestricted reuse. Patents applied for and patents issued. Licenses of technology by industry. Number of formal and informal publications and presentations.Objective 4) Develop new and economical water treatment approaches. Explore through scientific study and engineering design, new approaches to water treatment that enhance economical water reuse and recycling of degraded or marginal waters.Efforts- Deliver science-based knowledge through formal or informal publication/presentation and educational programs including formal classroom instruction, student research experiences, extension and outreach.Evaluation- Measurement of pathogens and contaminants destructively removed from wastewaters. Cost and process efficiency for removal and water recycling for unrestricted reuse. Patents applied for and patents issued. Licenses of technology by industry. Number of formal and informal publications and presentations.Objective 5) Advance collaborations with researchers and industrial partners.Efforts- Deliver science-based knowledge through formal or informal publication and educational programs including outreach to industry and businesses with interests in the related areas. Co-design and co-conduct research with industrial application.Evaluation- Number of cooperating industrial partners. Cost and process efficiency for removal and water recycling for unrestricted reuse. Patents applied for and patents issued. Licenses of technology products by industry. Number of formal and informal publications and presentations.Objective 6) Apply new media to courseware development in toxicology. Generate new animations of anatomy and physiology related to toxicology. Film doculectures on course topics. Produce courseware in environmental toxicology and food toxicology.Efforts- Deliver science-based knowledge through formal or informal publication/presentation and educational programs including formal classroom instruction, student research experiences, extension and outreach.Evaluation- Successful deployment of new courseware. Student achievement of learning objectives and demonstration via assessment of course material. Student course evaluations and reviews.