PI: Meng Wang, PhD, PE
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Graduate Students
Leiyu He, PhD candidate (Sep. 2019-present)
Tengge Zhang, PhD candidate (Sep. 2019-present)
Tengge Zhang graduated from Shandong University in China with a BS in Environmental Engineering. She got her MS from University of Southern California, majoring in environmental and engineering. Her research focuses on algal-bacterial consortia for nutrient management and resource recovery. She also works on the mathematical modeling of the hybrid IX and biological processes. She got NSF IGE scholarship and will conduct research at National Autonomous University of Mexico. She likes hiking, traveling, pottery, and climbing in her spare time.
Oluwayomi Awe, PhD student (2021- present)
Oluwayomi Awe (for shorts, Yomi) got her Bachelor of Technology degree in Industrial Chemistry from the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria (2008), and a Master of Science in Analytical Chemistry from the University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria (2012). She joined the graduate program of Energy and Mineral Engineering at Penn State in 2021. Her research focuses on the cotreatment of municipal wastewater and acid mine drainage to produce hydrogen gas and recover metals, using microbial electrolysis cells. In 2022, he received the National Science Foundation Innovations in Graduate Education (NSF-IGE) Sustainable Development Program internship in Engineering for sustainable water treatment being hosted by the University of Auckland, New Zealand. At the University of Ibadan, she worked on the determination of heavy metals from the sediments of streams and rivers in the Ibadan metropolis of Oyo State, Nigeria. She has also had the opportunity to research the assessment of radiological parameters of soil in Kogi State, Nigeria. Her hobbies include playing chess, singing, writing songs, adventure, and gardening.
Elham Rahimi, PhD student (co-advise with Dr. Shimin Liu) (2021-present)
Elham Rahimi is a graduate student in the John and Willie Leone Family Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering at Penn State. Elham earned her master’s in geotechnical engineering from the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology in 2020, and her master’s in mineral engineering from Amirkabir University of Technology in Tehran in 2015. She also earned a bachelor’s in mining engineering from University of Kurdistan in Iran in 2013. Her doctoral research is on methane-rich gas production from the co-bioconversion of coal and anaerobic digestion sludge.
Priyasha Fernando, PhD student (2022- present)
Priyasha Fernando was born and raised in Sri Lanka. She joined the Ph.D. program in Energy and Mineral Engineering at Penn State in the Fall of 2022. Her research aims at mineral precipitation and hydrogen production from acid mine drainage using microbial electrochemical cells. Before joining Penn State, she graduated from Kansas State University with a BS in Chemical Engineering and a secondary major in Biological Engineering in the Spring of 2019. Due to her interests in resource recovery and reuse from wastewater, she obtained the MS degree in Civil/Environmental Engineering in the Summer of 2022 at Kansas State University. She enjoys crocheting, cooking, baking, and gardening in her free time.
Xiaobai Hu, MS student (2022- present)
Xiaobai Hu is a master student in Civil Engineering at Penn State. She got her BS from Beijing University of Civil Engineering and Architecture. She attended summer exchange program at University of California, Berkeley in 2018. Her research focuses on the biological recovery of critical minerals.
Research Scientist/Postdoc
Dr. Waleed M. M. El-Sayed (2022-present)
Waleed has B.Sc. & Master’s degrees in Botany and Microbiology from Al-Azhar University. He received his doctorate from Al-Azhar University, wherein he focused on developing algal biomass crop protection strategies and investigating the effect of some chemicals on algal genome stability by mapping the distribution of ribonucleotides. Prior to joining Penn State, he was a researcher at the Marine Microbiology Department, at the National Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries, Egypt. In March 2022, he joined Dr. Meng Wang’s group at Penn State to mindfulness of microbial ecology and the interactions among different microorganisms in algae-based wastewater treatment systems.
Undergraduate Research Assistant
Maryn McConkey, undergraduate student in Environmental Systems Engineering
Maryn is an Undergraduate student in the Schreyer Honors College studying Environmental Systems Engineering with a minor in Spanish. She is currently working with Tengge Zhang on her honors thesis, and is excited for her summer internship with Mass Electric Construction Company. She is from just outside of Boston, MA and loves traveling, running, and cooking in her free time.
