The federally funded center began operating this month. It is one of five new Hazardous Substance Research Centers, and is supported by the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, universities, industries, and state and other federal agencies.
Each center has a specific focus, concentrating on different issues and strategies to reduce and control hazardous substances in the environment. The Purdue-based center, with a consortium of eight universities, will focus on bioremediation, or using microbes to clean up pollution; phytoremediation, or using plants to get rid of contamination; and natural attenuation, or allowing the natural environment to cleanse itself over time.
"There has never been a center that has focused exclusively on these biological remediation technologies," said Kathy Banks, the center's director and a professor of civil engineering at Purdue. "Bioremediation and phytoremediation are gaining acceptance in the United States.
"Appropriate use of these technologies is being encouraged by the EPA, by industry and by community groups because they are noninvasive and low-cost."
The EPA Hazardous Substance Research Center Program began in 1989. Purdue will replace two former centers that had been led by Kansas State University and the University of Michigan.
"It was a fairly daunting task to go up against centers that had been operating for 10 years," Banks said, noting that her focus on phytoremediation helped Purdue successfully compete for the center. Banks will lead a diverse team of researchers with backgrounds ranging from biology and chemistry to engineering.
The center's associate directors are Lakshmi N. Reddi, a professor and head of Kansas State Univer
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Contact: Emil Venere
venere@purdue.edu
765-494-4709
Purdue University
27-Nov-2001