Lassonde Civil Engineering Researchers Receive Best Paper Award

Lassonde School of Engineering Professor, Satinder Kaur Brar and colleagues, have received the award for 2021 Best Theoretical Oriented Paper from the Journal of Hazardous, Toxic and Radioactive Waste.

The paper, entitled “Simple Techno-economic Approach to Chlortetracycline Removal from Wastewater Treatment Plant”, was led by Drs. Rama Pulicharla and Pratik Kumar. They were both supervised by Prof. Satinder Kaur Brar while at Institut national de la recherche scientifique – Centre Eau Terre Environnement, Université du Québec, as well as Dr. R.Y. Surampalli, GIEES, USA and Prof. Azadeh Kermanshahi-Pour from Dalhousie University.

The paper summarizes the techno-economic aspects of various treatment methods for the removal of antibiotics, such as chlortetracycline, in the wastewater treatment plant. Combined treatment strategies, including chemical and biological treatment methods for the removal of antibiotics in sludge and wastewater, were studied by Dr. Pulicharla. Dr. Kumar then summarized and interpreted the results, to derive the optimized treatment methods in terms of technology efficiency and cost. Of the advanced oxidation technologies studied, ferro sonication and ultrasonic assisted laccase were the optimal methods to remove antibiotics from wastewater effluent and wastewater sludge, respectively.

This research is ongoing at Lassonde and York University, Dr. Brar’s group is currently working to understanding antibiotics complexation with metals in wastewater and corresponding antibiotic resistance. Further, they are exploring the phenomenon of antibiotics-metal complexes in wastewater that are easy to form, but complicated to remove.

To read the paper, visit the ASCE website.

Dr. Satinder Kaur Brar holds the James and Joanne Love Chair in Environmental Engineering and is a Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering, Lassonde School of Engineering at York University, Toronto, Canada.

Dr. Rama Pulicharla is currently a postdoctoral researcher, Department of Civil Engineering, Lassonde School of Engineering at York University, Toronto, Canada.

Dr. Pratik Kumar is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Institut National de la Research Scientifique- Eau, Terre, and Environment (INRS-ETE), University du Quebec, Quebec City, Canada.

The paper is invited for presentation at the 2021 World Environmental & Water Resources Congress online in June 2021. This event is hosted by the Environmental & Water Resources Institute, which is the American Society of Civil Engineer’s technical source for environmental and water-related issues. For details and registration information, visit the Environmental & Water Resources Institute website.