Kathleen Purvis-Roberts
Scripps College, CA·Earth & Environmental Science
Canals in Bangkok, Thailand, carry boats, supply water and host recreation for a huge city. They also receive storm runoff, farm pollution and industrial emissions.
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
Chemistry
Ecology & Evolution
- Topics
water quality
environmental chemistry
water microbiology
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2028
What they work on
- Track how water chemistry and microbiology change over time in Bangkok's Bang Mod area canals, using student-built low-cost continuous samplers, to judge if the water is fit for farming and household use.
- Develop paper-based sensors that measure water chemistry and detect microbial pathogens in canal water.
- Determine whether rising canal salinity stems from Bangkok Metropolitan Authority water management or from saltwater intrusion from the Gulf of Thailand.
- Relate water quality to microbial, plant, insect and animal communities in and along the canal, using DNA sequencing and field species surveys.
More about the research
Residents along the canals want to use the water for farming and household needs, but no one is sure it is safe, and the water has grown saltier over the past decade. It is unclear whether this comes from city water management or from seawater pushing in from the Gulf of Thailand.
Why it matters
Tens of thousands of canal-side residents in Bangkok could gain clearer information on whether canal water is safe for farming and household use. Learning whether rising salt comes from water management or seawater intrusion could guide local decisions. The low-cost sensors and community-based approach could be used in other places with similar water problems.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Davida Smyth
Texas A&M University-San Antonio, TX·Education Research
Test whether community-based environmental research helps recruit and retain undergraduate STEM students, using participant surveys and online assessment tools during 10-week summer projects.
Carmella Vizza
Hawaii Pacific University, HI·Earth & Environmental Science
Test whether saltwater introduction lowers methane emissions because sulfate-reducing bacteria outcompete methanogens, comparing freshwater control, saltwater-treated and naturally intertidal ponds in Hawai'i.
Yu-Ping Chin
University of Delaware, DE·Earth & Environmental Science
Measure how stemflow, the rainfall channeled down tree trunks to the soil, changes across a transect running from healthy coastal forest to saltwater-killed ghost forest.
The school
Scripps College: 2 labs on PI Pages.
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