Solid Liquid Innovation Lab (SLI-Lab):
​
Water/Wastewater treatment and water quality monitoring are important components of all urban and rural infrastructures, which include both municipal and industrial  sectors. Population growth, climate change, and environmental quality deterioration create enormous pressures on infrastructure system regarding both water quality and quantity.
​Dr. Zhao’s research program investigates fundamental and practical principles that can be applied to design, operation and maintenance of water/wastewater, solid waste and other infrastructures to be high-performing, cost-effective, resource-efficient and environment-friendly.

Research areas
  • Water/Wastewater infrastructure resilience;
  • Water-Energy-Food nexus;​
  • Solid and hazardous waste management;​

Education

Professional appointments

  • Assistant Professor (tenure track), North Carolina A&T University, Greensboro NC, 2018-now
  • Assistant Professor (tenure track), Lamar University, Beaumont TX, 2015-2018
  • Company advisor/ Senior Process Engineer, Entex Technology Inc., 2015-2018
  • Associate Research Scientist, District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority-Columbia University in the City of New York, 2014- 2015
  • ​R&D Process Engineer, Veolia Water Solution and Technology, 2012- 2014

Awards

  • Received by Zhao 
  • The American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists (AAEES) 40 Under 40 Recognition Program in 2023
  • Honorable mention, Outstanding Young Investigator award, 2021-2022, North Carlina A&T SU
  • Junior Faculty Teaching Excellence Award, 2021-2022, College of Engineering, North Carolina A&T SU
  • Summer Research SEED Fund. Centers of Excellence, North Carolina A&T SU, 2020
  • Summer Research SEED Fund. North Carolina A&T SU, 2019
  • Research Enhancement Grant (REG), Lamar University, 2017-2018
  • Research Enhancement Grant (REG), Lamar University 2016-2017
  • Virginia Water Environment Association (VWEA) Sonny Roden Scholarship, Hampton, VA, 2010
  • Champion in the Design competition in the Sixth Annual VA AWWA Student Water Challenge, Richmond VA, 2009
  • “Guanghua” Scholarship, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China, 2006
  • “Renmin” Scholarship, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China, 2004
  •  

  • Received by Zhao group member 
  • Travel award, 2022 AEESP Conference at Washington University in St. Louis,  June 28-30, 2022, St. Louis MO (student awardee: Harsh V. Patel)
  • HDR Water Scholarship, 2021 ($10k tuition + summer internship, student awardee: Harsh V. Patel)
  • NanoTechnology Entrepreneurship Challenge (NTEC-MUNI) award, Virginia Tech NanoEarth 2021. (student awardees: Myles Greer [UG], Temitope Soneye)
  • 9th Annual Graduate Research Poster Presentation Competition, College of Engineering, NC A&T SU April 28-29, 2020 (student awardee: Harsh V. Patel)
  • Texas Water University Forum presentation competition 2nd place 2018 (student awardee: Sailee Gawande)
  • TX AWWA Local Scholarship 2017 (student awardee: Alfred Wadee), Houston, TX, 2017
  • TX AWWA technical research paper award (student awardee: Alfred Wadee), Houston, TX, 2017
  • AAUW Fellowship (student awardee: Synthia Mallick), Beaumont TX, 2016-2017
  • Texas Hazardous Waste Management Society Fellowship (student awardee: Alfred Wadee), Beaumont, TX, 2016
  • Water Environment Association of Texas (WEAT) (as the advisor, student awardee: Synthia Mallick), Beaumont TX, 2016-2017

news

November 2022: Dr. Zhao was recognized by the AAEES 40 under 40 program.
September 2022: Harsh passed PhD preliminary exam, congratulations~
August 2022: Dr. Zhao receives NSF grant: #2216148 MRI: Acquisition of a liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometer for interdisciplinary research and education on the campus of North Carolina A&T State University
May 2022: Dr. Zhao receives NC Collaboratory grant: ​Sequestering PFAS in concentrated sources
August 2022: New master student, Sadman Sakib, joined the group, welcome~
January 2022: New master student, Md. Redowan Rashid, joined the group, welcome~
November 2021: Dr. Zhao receives NC DOJ Environmental Enhancement Grant:  Environmental impacts of landfill induced anthropogenic dissolved organic nitrogen in Eastern North Carolina estuaries.
and presented during NC Attorney General Josh Stein's visit at NC A&T.
August 2021: Dr. Zhao receives NSF grant: CBET 2101053 Excellence in Research: Delineating the characteristics, transformation and water quality impacts of landfill leachate induced dissolved organic nitrogen.
August 2021: New PhD student, Ashik Ahmed, join the group, welcome~
August 2020: Two new PhD students, Samiha and Temitope, join the group, welcome both of you~
May 2020: Dr. Zhao won a SEED fund from the Center of Excellence in Advanced Manufacturing to study PFAS mitigation in water environment.
April 2020: Harsh won the second place (out of 100+) at the 9th Annual Graduate Research Poster Presentation Competition in the College of Engineering at NC A&T SU, congrats! 
February 2020: Harsh and Dr. Zhao attended the 7th Global Waste Management Symposium in Indian Wells, CA and gave two oral presentations on landfill leachate treatment.
January 2020: Dr. Zhao won a grant from Waste Management Inc. to study remediation of emerging contaminants from landfill leachate.
January 2020: Myles Greer, Sophomore in Civil Engineering joins the group for undergraduate research, Welcome Myles~
May 2019: Dr. Zhao won the 2019 Summer Research Seed Funding Program by NC A&T DORED to develop PFAS fate and transport, and treatment techniques.
February 2019: Dr. Zhao won a grant from Waste Management to continue landfill leachate research.
August 2018: Both Harsh Patel and Sailee Gawande successfully defended their MS thesis, great congrats~
April 2018: Sailee Gawande won second place in research presentation competition at University Forum of Texas Water 2018 conference, great congrats~
December 2017: Alfred Wadee passed his MS defense, he is going to work for HDR consulting in Raleigh NC from Jan. 2018, great congrats~
November 2017: Alfred Wadee won SE TX AWWA local scholarship, congrats~
September 2017: Hurricane Harvey swung by Beaumont TX and caused flooding and water outage, samples collection and testing are going on, link. ​
August 2017: Synthia Mallick passed MS defense, great congrats!!! She will go to Marquette University for PhD.
June 2017: Arun is going to work as a process engineer for Ovivo Water in Austin, congrats~
May 2017: Synthia gets a paper accepted by WEFTEC 2017, congrats!
May 2017: Alfred is doing a summer intern with MWH/Stantec consulting in Houston, congrats~
April 2017: Harsh gets a paper presented at TX Water 2017 in Austin, great job! 
Jan 2017: Alfred won TX AWWA/WEAT student technical paper award, great job!
Apr 2016: Synthia won AAUW fellowship, congrats! 
Mar 2016: Elevated temperature landfill issue caught operators' concern, link.
Feb 2016: Zhao served as session moderator at GWMS 2016
Jan 2016: VT Water Researchers to the Rescue in Flint Michigan, proud of you guys!