Keri Hornbuckle stands in a lab
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2 faculty members named 2023 UI Distinguished Chairs

Keri Hornbuckle, IIHR researcher and civil and environmental engineering professor, is one of two faculty named 2023 University of Iowa Distinguished Chairs, one of the most prestigious honors granted to UI faculty.
Casey Harwood
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Casey Harwood earns NSF CAREER award to study fluid-structure interactions

The CAREER grant is among NSF’s most prestigious awards in support of early-career faculty.
A and B options in the framework app
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Mitigation Game

Greg Ewing, a PhD student at IIHR is working with IIHR Researcher Ibrahim Demir to build new ways for communities to prepare for and respond to the next disaster.
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What’s in Your Water?

IIHR's Zhi and LeFevre took samples and measured chemical composition of a local creek for over three years in an ecological study.
Schilling stands with a table in a ditch
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Road Ditches Reduce Nutrients

Keith Schilling’s recent research suggests that water quality challenges in Iowa and nationally would be even greater if it weren’t for a little appreciated feature of the landscape — road ditches.
Three men sit around a table
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Water for Today — and Tomorrow

The Iowa Geological Survey developed a 3-D local-scale groundwater flow model and used it to predict future water availability for industries and communities in Linn and Johnson counties.
Fred Stern poses at the wave basin.

Stern Receives SNAME’s Taylor Medal

IIHR’s Fred Stern has been selected to receive the 2018 David W. Taylor Medal for Notable Achievement in Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering.
Five-story red brick building, Stanley Hydraulics Lab, set on the banks of the Iowa River in Iowa City.

Iowa Dives Into the Future of Water Research

Building on decades of hydroscience research, IIHR at the University of Iowa enters a new era of activity aimed at solving Earth’s biggest environmental issues.
Close up of testing card.

Citizen Science: Water Monitoring

IIHR's Chris Jones is recruiting public volunteers to participate in a study which uses a smartphone app to detect nitrate levels in local watersheds using their phone’s camera.
YouTube screen grab of James Buchholz.

Research Summaries in 90 Seconds or Less!

Four members of IIHR—Hydroscience & Engineering’s research staff participated in the Communicating Ideas Workshop and recorded short video clips explaining their research.
Aerial shot of Morgan Creek Oxbow.

Oxbow Restorations Benefit Habitat, Ecosystem

Oxbow restorations provide wildlife habitat for creatures that like these quiet backwaters, and they also process nutrients. And they’re surprisingly affordable.
Photo of Ricardo Mantilla Gutierrez on a bridge.

Predicting Floods with Computer Simulations

IIHR's Ricardo Mantilla is the principal architect of the Iowa Flood Center's flood prediction model, HLM-Async.
Matthew Streeter on a dirt road
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Water-quality Project Underway in Buchanan County

A new project funded by the Iowa Nutrient Research Center aims to understand the nutrient reduction benefits of roadside ditches.
A hand holds a trout
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Solving Urban Runoff Water-Quality Problems

IIHR, and the Cedar Rapids Public Works department installed real-time water-quality sensors on a stormwater outfall on McLoud Run
A machine harvests soybeans
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Corn is King, but Soybeans Have an Impact Too

Soybeans now rival corn
An agricultural tile empties water into an Iowa Stream
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Surprising Phosphorus Trends

We now know that total phosphorus concentrations have significantly decreased at a dozen sites on Iowa’s rivers. Phosphorus, along with nitrate, is commonly used as fertilizer; both contribute to nutrients in Iowa’s rivers and streams and ultimately all the way downstream to the Gulf of Mexico.
Tom Stoeffler speaks with Dan Mahoney standing in a river. The water-quality sensor can be seen behind them
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IIHR’s Water-quality Network Grows

Thanks to a network of water-quality sensors deployed and maintained by IIHR—Hydroscience & Engineering, water-quality data is now readily available for many sites in Iowa.
Corn plants stretching as far as you can see on the left, and soybeans going just as far on the right
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Understanding Changes in Raccoon River Nitrate

As Iowa farmers have planted more acres of corn to meet the demand driven by the corn-based ethanol industry, many models predicted that nitrate concentrations in Iowa streams would increase accordingly. However, recent IIHR research based on water monitoring and published in the Journal of Soil and Water Conservation casts doubt on these predictions.
A seated man near the Iowa River in fall
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What’s in the Water?

Greg LeFevre, who joined IIHR in January as an assistant research scientist, is particularly interested in what becomes of certain contaminants as they move through the final stages of the water cycle. LeFevre studies biotransformation—or the chemical alteration—of contaminants in aquatic environments.
A portrait of Kathryn Klarich wearing a blue scarf
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Gravitating Toward the Water

Klarich, a new member of the Cwiertny Lab, researches neonicotinoids, a class of insecticide that was found to be present in the Iowa River by the U.S. Geological Survey and IIHR researchers in 2014.