Hydrology and Biogeochemical Laboratory
Room: 310
PI: Dr. Craig Allan
The Hydrology and Biogeochemical Lab is equipped for analyzing a variety of environmental research problems, from water chemistry to soil analysis. Chemical characterization of water samples can be performed using the labs two Dionex DX-500 Ion Chromatographs for analyzing cations and anions, as well as the Shimadzu TOC-V Total Organic Carbon and Nitrogen analyzer and the FLASH 2000 CHNS Analyzer, both of which are capable of analyzing solid samples.
Current projects
- Evaluation of Manufactured Stormwater Best Management Practices for NCDOT
- Beaver Dam Creek Watershed Monitoring
The Hydrology Lab is also home to the department’s Thermo Electron X Series Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass spectrometer (ICP-M.S.). ICP-M.S. uses a high energy plasma to break dissolved samples into their component atoms, and then into ions. The ions are separated by mass, and only ions of specific mass are allowed to reach the detector at any one time. The detector records the number of counts of each mass and compares this count rate to that of elements of known concentrations in a standard solution. This is used to convert counts on the detector to element concentrations in the unknown samples.
