Undergraduate Research

What’s in your Water?

For Kevin Baird, engineering came as a second calling after he received a degree in botany from Ohio University.

“I felt I would have more impact on the world as an engineer,” he said.

A civil engineering student, Baird looked at the effects carbon-based fullerenes, a common type of nanoparticle and a byproduct of the nanotechnology used in drug delivery and energy conversion, have on the environment.

Baird’s project, for which he won an Ohio State Undergraduate Honors Research Scholarship, tested the ability of conventional water filtration to remove these nanoparticles from drinking water. This research, he said, would have practical applications toward regulating these nanoparticles in our water systems.

“One of the most common ways to filter drinking water is through sand filtration, percolating the water through sand to remove impurities,” Baird explained. “This experiment gave us the idea that sand filters would be effective in removing these fullerenes from drinking water if they are found to be toxic.”