Emerging Environmental Technologies

In this day and age, it is unfortunate that the economic prosperity and development leads to disruption of the dynamic balance of the environment. The philosophy of sustainable development has been presented for a long period of time but it has not been able to bring about a substantial change in our society. The transformation of this philosophy into a practical reality seems to be far away - at least in the foreseeable future. In my opinion, the only way I see the revolution taking place is for us to incorporate 'sustainability' in our daily living and to keep pushing for a sustainable society. Meanwhile, we also need scientists to work on technologies that would lead us to that goal at a faster pace. Technologies that are 'completely' environmentally friendly are needed urgently. And if such technologies or ideas of one exists, a platform is required that showcases such ideas to the scientific and non-scientific audience. Through this book, I am happy to present the thoughts of seven different research groups whose work may lead us to the doorsteps of sustainable society. As scientists, most of us specialize in a sub-topic that may be related to one of the three environmental components - air, land, or water. Over a period of time, we become so engrossed with the sub-discipline of our specialization that we only have glimpses of what is happening in other disciplines.

Dr. Shah obtained his doctorate degree from Sardar Patel University, India, he then became a UNESCO-ROSTE Fellow at the Academy of Sciences of Czech Republic, Prague. He did his post-doctorate research at Polytechnic University, New York and is currently an Assistant Professor in Environmental Microbiology at Dowling College, New York. His research expertise includes drinking water treatment and conversion of environmental wastes to value added products.