Wayne State University scientists partner to provide stewardship for the Great Lakes

Scientists at Wayne State University from the College of Engineering, School of Medicine, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, College of Education and the Law School have teamed up to provide stewardship for the Detroit-area region of the Great Lakes. This group of Wayne State University faculty and research personnel comprises the Urban Watershed and Environmental Research Group (UWERG) whose aim is to exemplify leadership of watershed research and management in our urban environment.

"The main focus of our group is to have cross-disciplinary approaches because water does not stay in one place so it can't stay in one field of study-water can be an economic, energy and a public health issue all at the same time," explains Carol Miller, lead co-director of UWERG and professor of civil and environmental engineering.

Miller played a key role in the group's initial formation, but the official foundation of UWERG in 2009 was a collective, grass-roots effort throughout many colleges to establish a network of water related research going on at Wayne State. The UWERG website is hosted by the College of Engineering with a purpose of reflecting that collective effort. The recent Erb Family Foundation award for Healthy Urban Waters was gifted to the College of Engineering for UWERG's use in advancing their research efforts.

The Great Lakes water system serves as a biologically diverse aquatic habitat and the drinking water for more than 15 million people. Combined, the lakes contain 84% of surface freshwater in the US and 21% of the world's surface freshwater. In Michigan, these raw and purified waters are essential for more than 80 water-related industries and make possible more than 700,000 regional jobs. The group concentrates on the Huron-Erie corridor, a geographical area that includes Lake St. Clair, the St. Clair River, the Detroit River, Lake Erie and the watersheds corresponding to these three interconnected bodies of water.

"There are a lot of cities near the Great Lakes, but because of our location in Detroit, we are in a very unique position for research and stewardship due to our positioning between the Detroit River and the two lakes Erie and Huron," explains Audrey Zarb, biologist and communication designer for UWERG.

"Although the idea that all life depends on water is generally accepted, our modern culture is practically designed to make it easy to forget where our water comes from and harder for us to understand that clean freshwater is a limited and precious resource," continues Zarb.

"We [Detroit and Michigan residents] have this huge privilege and responsibility of being situated right in the middle of it all," says Miller. "The environmental problems associated with the Great Lakes waters and watersheds are especially acute in urban regions, like Detroit, where natural and human influences collide and threaten environmental and public health."

UWERG research is centered on establishing important foundational tools to progress conservancy efforts in the future. They do this by gathering better, more accurate, more inclusive, and more in-depth methods and data that, in turn, improve scientists' ability to understand how to keep water safe, clean and healthy.

Many of UWERG's current initiatives are having an immediate and immense impact on the surrounding community including efforts to design safer bridges that have suffered from water-related deterioration and designing monitoring technology that will allow the public to be notified in two hours instead of the current 24 when a beach or body of water is unsafe. Further, members of UWERG are hard at work optimizing a distribution system that will better reduce pollution in the Great Lakes by reducing energy usage
A recent research project involving a UWERG scientist focused on fisheries and the public understandings of what types and how much fish you can catch and consume, resulted in improved informational posters for Detroiters and members of the surrounding community.

"The group saw a need by recognizing the vast amount of misinformation related to fisheries and through collaboration they were better able to communicate with the general public to provide more accurate information," explains Zarb. "For example, many Detroiters were surprised to learn that it is much safer to fish in the Detroit River than previously thought."

A primary goal for UWERG is to collect and compile their research in an accessible manner that can be disseminated widely to the general public. With this goal in mind, the group not only generates scholarly activity and educates college-level students, but also informs K-12 students and the general public through interacting with watershed stakeholders, like urban and rural residents; local, state or federal government agencies; elected officials; agricultural producers; recreational users and wildlife enthusiasts.

"It is very important to us that with an issue as serious as maintaining our surface freshwater supply that we always maintain a focus on relatable means and identify projects that directly address the needs of the community," says Miller. "Our ultimate goal is to motivate and involve every member of our community so that we can work together to provide unparalleled stewardship for the Great Lakes, a very precious resource for our region and the world."

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 380 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.