School/College

School of Engineering; College of Science and Engineering

Email

Marta.vignola@glasgow.ac.uk

Twitter

@martavig5

Research vision

I am a post-doctoral research associate in the Department of Water and Infrastructure of the University of Glasgow; I am currently working in collaboration with Scottish Water to develop innovative tools for effective design and manage low-cost decentralized drinking water treatments. Drinking water is one of the Earth's most precious resources, yet the quantity and quality of water available are increasingly threatened by several challenges globally (Global warming, increase in population, industrialization, etc.). My greatest ambition is to transform our approach towards the design of treatment technologies in the water industry by revolutionizing the strategies for developing, directing and controlling the activity of complex microbial communities. I wish to advance the research in the development of engineering and designing tools and propose innovative, bioengineered solutions for sustainable and low-cost water treatments. I firmly believe that a multidisciplinary approach, involving ecological and metabolic modelling, molecular biology analyses and classical principles of engineering design, will be a key innovation driver in this sector. My unique profile that exists on the interface between Environmental Engineering, Environmental Microbiology and Microbial Ecology of drinking water systems make me an ideal specialist to undertake this type of research.

Expectations from collaboration

I am interested in implementing ecological models into the development of tools for the effective design of water and waste-water biological treatments. I want to collaborate with ecologists that are interested in combining innovative ecological tools with principles of engineering design to advance the research on this area. Furthermore, considering the global nature of my research (development of sustainable, low-cost water treatment), I would also like to collaborate with people working in or in collaboration with low- and middle-income countries, to develop tailored low-cost technologies.

Key Skills

  • Ecological modelling,
  • Microbial resource management,
  • Water and wastewater treatment process design and optimisation,
  • Bioinformatics analyses. 

 

First published: 7 May 2019

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MArta Vignola