Co-op Program Coordinator of the Ecohydrology Research Group
My research focuses on investigation of the effects of ongoing and future climate and land use changes and management practices on the fate of carbon, nutrients and contaminants, as well as on biogeochemical fluxes between the atmosphere, hydrosphere and geosphere. That is, my work falls within the general area of Critical Zone Science with a particular focus on northern cold regions (e.g., Canada's temperate to subarctic and permafrost regions) to understand the impacts of climate warming and human activities on aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, water resources and the sustainability of Canada’s water, soil and other natural resources. My fundamental and applied research on soil and water quality and hydrogeochemical processes contribute to the understanding of the complex process dynamics within soils, sediments and surface water and groundwaters, from both physical and hydrogeochemical perspectives, and how these processes are better informed by an improved examination of surface water and groundwater interactions and subsurface hydro(bio)geochemical processes. I have extensive experience in innovative approaches and novel laboratory and field techniques for terrestrial and wetland ecosystems, specifically with soil and water quality, and nutrient and greenhouse gas flux monitoring. I have recently developed and implemented novel techniques in the lab, including automated water table fluctuating and freeze-thaw soil column systems, an automated flow injection switch-box, pore water sampling devices, hydro(bio)geophysical sensor and high resolution electrochemistry sensors for innovative research projects, which will allow to advance my research by upscaling the bench scale systems for validating and accurately addressing physical and chemical heterogeneity at multiple spatial scales and to develop models of hydrogeochemical processes at watershed scale.
Since becoming a faculty member in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, I have brought new and unique strengths in environmental science and initiated a large number of research projects. I have been a PI, Co-PI or collaborator on grants totaling more than $21M from a diversity of funding sources, including the Natural Sciences and Engineering Council (NSERC), the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (CFI), the CFREF-funded Global Water Futures program, Qatar National Research Fund, US Department of Energy, and industrial partners. Recognized for my dedication to international research collaborations, I have trained >75 PhD, MSc and BSc students and Postdoctoral Fellows.
My current research areas include studies on:
- Ecohydrology
- Watershed Science
- Critical Zone Hydrogeochemistry
- Soil processes
- Hydrogeochemical processes of aquatic-terrestrial interfaces
- Biogeochemical cycles of nutrients
- Water quality
- Terrestrial ecosystem processes
- Groundwater-surface water interactions
- Hydrological and biogeochemical processes of peatlands and wetlands
- Seasonal freeze/thaw dynamics
- Flow and transport in porous media (particularly in complex dual-porosity)
- HydroBioGeoPhysics: Geophysical methods to assess subsurface biogeochemical processes
- Reactive interfaces in agroecosystem
- Winter soil processes
- Fate and transport of nutrients
- Microplastics in the environment
Contact
Office: EIT 2006
Phone: 519-888-4567 ext. 41214
E-mail: frezanez@uwaterloo.ca