Staff and supporting scientific committee members at the Mine Overlay Site Testing Facility
Jeffrey J. McDonnell is Professor of Hydrology and Associate Director of the Global Institute for Water Security at the University of Saskatchewan (Canada), University Distinguished Professor of Hydrology (adjunct) at Oregon State University (USA), 6th Century Chair of Hydrology at the University of Aberdeen (UK) and Honorary Professor of Hydrology at the Nanjing Hydraulic Research Institute (China). Prior to returning to Canada in 2012, he was the Richardson Chair in Watershed Science at Oregon State University since 1999. He was a Commonwealth Scholar to New Zealand and completed his PhD at the University of Canterbury in 1989; he was awarded the DSc in 2009. Prof. McDonnell’s research focuses on new ways to measure, understand and model streamflow generation processes. Jeff has coauthored ~200 journal articles on watershed hydrology and co-edited the Elsevier textbook “Isotope Tracers in Catchment Hydrology”. Jeff has been USRA Fellow at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, STA Fellow at the Japan Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute, Hayward Fellow at Landcare New Zealand, Gledden Fellow at University of Western Australia, STINT Fellow at Stockholm University and Nannerl Keohane Distinguished Visiting Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, the Geological Society of America, the International Water Academy and the Royal Geographical Society (UK). He has received the Dalton Medal from the European Geophysical Union, the Birdsall-Dreiss Distinguished Lecturer Award from the Geological Society of America, the Gordon Warwick Award from the British Geomorphological Research Group, the Nystrom Award from the Association of American Geographers He is currently President-Elect of the AGU Hydrology Section.
Dyan has been a research engineer at the UofS for the past 11 years. Areas of interest and expertise include agricultural waste containment, contamination and utilization; contaminant transport; mine reclamation research; tracking water movement using stable isotopes of water; experimental project design and fabrication.
My background is in accounting. Prior to coming to the University of Saskatchewan, for the last 21 years I worked for a multinational corporation headquartered in Germany as a controller of four different facilities. I eventually became the Regional Operations Controller for North America, where I was responsible for the finance and controlling functions of eight operating units throughout the US and Canada.
Phani is working as the Assistant Director at the Global Institute for Water Security (GIWS), University of Saskatchewan (UofS). In his current capacity, he is responsible to assist Prof. Howard Wheater, Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) in Water Security and Director GIWS for enhancement of the solid foundation in water-related research taking place at the UofS in order to enrich, expand, and optimize the institution’s profile as an international leader in water security. Consequently, he is responsible for the development of an integrated network of regional, national and international research activities for the UofS to leverage existing funding secured through the CERC in Water Security and other grants and contracts across campus. In addition, he works collaboratively as well as independently, interacting with and managing the needs of multiple stakeholders ranging from students (undergraduate and graduate) and faculty, to representatives of international agencies, various levels of government, industry partners, and community organizations or groups, located both on and off campus.
Specialization: Geotechnical/Geo-environmental: Saturated/Unsaturated Groundwater Flow and Contaminant Transport, Mine Waste Reclamation
Research Interests: Modelling flow and transport in the hydrological cycle; methods to improve collection, analysis, and interpretation of integrated hydrological data; hydrological change in northern latitudes; groundwater resource management; groundwater quality and sustainable development of natural resources; Integrated hydrological-epidemiological research
Research interests include: aqueous geochemistry, hydrogeology, isotope hydrology, to define, characterize, and assess mitigation measures relating to contamination of surface and ground waters by metal and metalloid at mine sites, solute transport in aquifers and aquitards, and agro-contaminants.
Mr. O’Kane has extensive mining industry experience and involvement in a wide range of mine property environmental projects. He also has a strong technical background in site-specific characterization of hydrology and hydrogeology, and their influence on the sustainable reclamation of mine waste material and management of surface water and groundwater. Mr. O’Kane has designed cover systems for application in humid and arid climates for control of acid mine drainage from mine waste rock and tailings at numerous sites in Argentina, Australia, Canada, Chile, and the USA. Each of these projects includes implementing all or some component of the design, implementation, and performance monitoring of cover systems at a detailed and/or feasibility level of design.
Anna is a PhD student in Dr. McDonnell's hillslope hydrology lab. Her research interests include runoff generation processes, catchment hydrology, hydrological connectivity and stable isotope methods.
