Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit, Great Rivers CESU

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The USGS is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for research and development of robust sensing materials to enable low-cost nitrate sensors for environmental deployment. Nitrate is a common pollutant in surface and ground water throughout the United States. It reaches waterways from fertilized fields, sewage and manure, landfills, industrial food processing, and sources that burn fossil fuels and biomass. To protect human health, nitrate is regulated in drinking water, which must be below 10 mg/L NO3-N. Moreover, nitrate synergizes with phosphorus to drive eutrophication, decrease biodiversity, and increase algal blooms and hypoxia in freshwater and marine ecosystems. One of these is the annual dead zone that occurs in the Gulf of Mexico. Algal blooms can introduce algal toxins, which in turn can kill or injure aquatic organisms and harm human health.

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