About

Arvin S. Bhandari, MD, is an Assistant Professor at Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine. His professional role involves contributing to medical education and research within the institution. His contact information indicates active engagement in the academic community, and his position suggests a focus on advancing medical knowledge and training future healthcare professionals.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Sociology
• Engineering management
• Law
• Demography
• Engineering
• Management

Selected publications

• Bamboo reconstituted destructured boards prepared from dendrocalamus somdevai for structural purposes as a substitute to wood

  Journal of the Indian Academy of Wood Science · 2023-07-02 · 2 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Diversity In Environmental Engineering: The Good And Bad

  2020 · 1 citations

  • Political Science
  • Sociology
  • Engineering

  Engineering diversity remains a problem in the USA despite ongoing efforts by government, academia, and the private sector. A committee of the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP) is characterizing diversity within the environmental engineering field to determine if there are unique issues associated with this profession that need to be addressed. For this effort, diversity includes gender and ethnic diversity in terms of African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Native Americans. The committee looked at populations of environmental engineering students (based on degrees granted), faculty, and practitioners using available data from the Engineering Workforce Commission, American Society of Engineering Education, U.S. Department of Labor, and the National Science Foundation. As expected, the study shows that contrary to engineering as a whole, the environmental engineering student population is very diverse in terms of gender. There is some gender diversity in terms of environmental engineering faculty, though numbers of female faculty are still below those for the general population. Also, there is a lower percentage of female environmental engineering faculty than the percentage of females graduating with doctorate degrees in that field. However, women are well represented among environmental engineering practitioners with a growing population trend related to the amount of degrees granted. Unfortunately, environmental engineering is not diverse in terms of ethnicity for students, faculty, and practitioners. At the aggregate level, ethnic diversity for environmental engineering is similar to engineering as a whole and well below the general population. Based on the aggregate results, the committee evaluated programs at ABET-accredited undergraduate environmental engineering programs and noted the subset of those colleges that are reportedly implementing best practices to enhance diversity and/or have a particular advantage in terms of attracting diverse students due to location, etc. This evaluation shows that those colleges that are somewhat successful at increasing ethnic diversity in engineering at the undergraduate level have similar success with environmental engineering programs. However, the remaining schools were less successful with achieving ethnic diversity in environmental engineering than within the overall engineering program. The results for ethnic diversity are limited because the populations are small. Additional study is also needed to determine the reasons why ethnically diverse students may choose engineering disciplines other than environmental engineering at a higher rate.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Research Integrated Curriculum In Geoenvironmental Engineering

  2020-09-03 · 1 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Abstract NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract Research-Integrated Curriculum in Geoenvironmental Engineering Alok Bhandari, Lakshmi N. Reddi, Larry E. Erickson, Stacy L. Hutchinson, and David R. Steward Departments of Civil Engineering, Chemical Engineering, and Biological & Agricultural Engineering, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506-5000 Introduction Rapid growth in global population and industrial development in the past few decades have led to several environmental problems related to soil and groundwater. As public agencies, private firms, and academia embarked on projects aimed at seeking solutions to waste management and subsurface contamination problems, it became clear that the scientific and engineering issues involved were diverse and required adoption of interdisciplinary approaches. The need for interdisciplinarity in assessing and solving geoenvironmental problems requires that students, researchers, engineering personnel and research managers synthesize and apply principles from a diverse set of disciplines. The immense growth in research on waste containment and site remediation coupled with the need for interdisciplinarity, brings about the necessity for the development of multidisciplinary and integrated research and curriculum development programs in geoenvironmental engineering. This paper presents a curriculum framework for geoenvironmental engineering developed with support from the National Science Foundation’s Combined Research-Curriculum Development (CRCD) program. The objectives of this curriculum are: 1. To synthesize relevant principles and themes from a number of allied disciplines in sciences and engineering such as environmental engineering, geotechnical engineering/geology, water resources engineering/hydrology/hydraulics, chemical engineering, biological and agricultural engineering/biological sciences, and agronomy/soil sciences; 2. To incorporate rapidly evolving research on subsurface fate and transfer processes, site remediation and waste containment methods into the curriculum; 3. To provide exposure to a multi-agency perspective such that “real world” site remediation and waste containment problems could be solved within the constraints of state and federal regulatory agencies; and 4. To incorporate interactive and experiential learning-oriented education methods and interdisciplinary team experiences into design education. Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering Education

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Preparing Students to Work Effectively as Members of Interdisciplinary Design Teams

  2017-09-25

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  This chapter explores the learning science associated with the education of engineering students as members of interdisciplinary design teams. Engineering students often work in teams on engineering laboratory experiments and in design classes. The growing complexities of modern "real-world" problems faced by industry, government, and universities have given rise to the need for interdisciplinary teams. Learning that may be essential for innovation often takes place as interdisciplinary teams meet, ask questions, suggest solutions, and share their knowledge about the design problem. When design results are obtained with computer-aided design software, it is important to evaluate the results and make sure all of the calculations, equations, and results are appropriate. Communication with respect to the work being done, range of acceptable values for design variables, and methods of arriving at the optimum design usually include a need to understand the software and outputs it provides.

  PublisherDOI

• Woodchip Denitrification Bioreactors: Impact of Temperature and Hydraulic Retention Time on Nitrate Removal

  Journal of Environmental Quality · 2015-11-12 · 158 citations

  articleOpen access

  Woodchip denitrification bioreactors, a relatively new technology for edge-of-field treatment of subsurface agricultural drainage water, have shown potential for nitrate removal. However, few studies have evaluated the performance of these reactors under varied controlled conditions including initial woodchip age and a range of hydraulic retention times (HRTs) and temperatures similar to the field. This study investigated (i) the release of total organic C (TOC) during reactor start up for fresh and weathered woodchips, (ii) nitrate (NO3–N) removal at HRTs ranging from 2 to 24 h, (iii) nitrate removal at influent NO3–N concentrations of 10, 30, and 50 mg L−1, and (iv) NO3–N removal at 10, 15, and 20°C. Greater TOC was released during bioreactor operation with fresh woodchips, whereas organic C release was low when the columns were packed with naturally weathered woodchips. Nitrate-N concentration reductions increased from 8 to 55% as HRT increased. Nitrate removal on a mass basis (g NO3–N m−3 d−1) did not follow the same trend, with relatively consistent mass removal measured as HRT increased from 1.7 to 21.2 h. Comparison of mean NO3–N load reduction for various influent NO3–N concentrations showed lower reduction at an influent concentration of 10 mg L−1 and higher NO3–N reductions at influent concentrations of 30 and 50 mg L−1. Nitrate-N removal showed a stepped increase with temperature. Temperature coefficient (Q10) factors calculated from NO3–N removal rates ranged from 2.2 to 2.9. Core Ideas The results are useful for informing field-specific design of denitrification woodchip bioreactors. Nitrate-N concentration reductions increased from 8 to 55% as hydraulic retention time increased. Nitrate-N removal showed a stepped increase with temperature. Weathered woodchips as a bioreactor substrate may reduce initial C losses to surface waters.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Denitrification in biofilm configured horizontal flow woodchip bioreactor: effect of hydraulic retention time and biomass growth

  Ecohydrology & Hydrobiology · 2014-12-06 · 36 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Occurrence of Tylosin-Resistant Enterococci in Swine Manure and Tile Drainage Systems under No-Till Management

  Water Air & Soil Pollution · 2013-10-17 · 20 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• PREPARATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF AMORPHOUS CEFUROXIME AXETIL

  INDIAN DRUGS · 2013-10-28

  articleSenior author

  In the present study, amorphous form of cefuroxime axetil was prepared and characterized by various methods. The result showed that the amorphous form of cefuroxime axetil with hydrophilic carriers was successfully obtained by freeze drying. The amorphous form showed a substantially higher dissolution rate and saturation solubility than cefuroxime axetil and physical mixture. The molecular behaviour of the drug in all samples were characterized by X-ray powder diffraction, Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy and differential scanning calorimetry. The dissolution and saturation solubility studies of the samples were performed. The X-ray powder diffraction, Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy and differential scanning calorimetry provided useful information to support the amorphousness of the samples.

  PublisherDOI

• Natural Treatment of Surface Water and Groundwater with Woodchip Reactors

  ACS symposium series · 2013-01-01 · 4 citations

  book-chapter

  Nitrate contamination is one of the most serious water quality challenges in California’s groundwater basins. Over-application of nitrogen-containing fertilizers increases nitrate levels in runoff, which in turn increases the nitrate level in shallow aquifers, rivers and lakes. In natural water systems, high concentration of nutrients like nitrate can cause the occurrence of eutrophication and hypoxia, or degradation of the groundwater quality by the increased concentration of dissolved solids in potential sources of drinking water. Human consumption of water with nitrate concentrations above maximum contaminant levels results in health problems such as blue-baby syndrome and cancer. Cost-effective and readily accessible woodchips bioreactors have been used in field-scale systems in the Midwest to reduce nitrate levels in surface and drainage waters. A laboratory bench-scale system, similar to that used in the field, was used to treat nitrogen-laden tile water in Iowa State University (ISU) and to treat Cal Poly Pomona groundwater that was naturally contaminated with nitrate. At universities, ISU and Cal Poly Pomona identical bioreactors where used to study the effectiveness of the systems. When treated in woodchip bioreactors, both tile water and groundwater nitrate concentrations were reduced below the drinking water standard (10 mg/L NO3-N). Retention time and flow rate were important factors to increase the effectiveness of the biological treatment. Bioreactors were run for at least 6 days to ensure stable microbial community while the degradation of nitrate was monitored. Nitrate percent removal was higher for tile water than for groundwater. For the Iowa tile water 8-hr retention time was enough to achieve 96 % nitrate removal, while less that 40% was achieved for groundwater at the same retention time. Our results indicated a range 15% to 40% removal rate of nitrate in groundwater. Woodchip bioreactors were amended with soil and succinate to increase microbial population and to stimulate denitrification through an external source of carbon. Addition of succinate increased nitrate removal to 73% in the groundwater system, indicating that the groundwater system was carbon-limited for optimum denitrification, but that denitrification can be enhanced by the addition of a harmless, easily degradable carbon source. Woodchip reactors are a low-cost system that can contribute to the remediation of California’s shallow groundwater systems.

  PublisherDOI

• Modeling and Calibration of Drainage Denitrification Bioreactor Design Criteria

  Journal of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering · 2013-04-04 · 30 citations

  articleSenior author

  Design methods for agricultural drainage denitrification bioreactors must be optimized for these novel systems to provide maximized water quality improvement. The objective of this paper was to further develop science-based bioreactor sizing guidelines by calibrating an existing design procedure with multiple years of drainage flow data collected at two sites in Iowa. The models created for the two hypothetical bioreactor sites showed the original design criteria (use of a design flow rate one-fifth of the peak flow rate) generally allowed simulated bioreactor treatment of the majority of total annual drainage volume, but treatment of this majority was not necessary to maximize nitrate removal. Larger bioreactors resulting from use of either increased design flow rate or higher design retention time increased the extent of nitrate removal, but had lower nitrate removal rates. This modeled simulation analysis informs that bioreactor design procedures considering flow rate and retention time should use design flow rates of 10 to 20% of the anticipated peak flow rate at design retention times of 6 to 8 h, thus updating and refining the original design procedure. This approach produces bioreactors of increased length to width ratios, with improved performance based on nitrate removal extent and removal rate. Further field-scale validation is suggested for this drainage bioreactor design procedure.

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• CAREER: Engineered Humification Processes: An Innovative Approach to Remediate Hazardous Waste Sites

  NSF · $222k · 1999–2004

Frequent coauthors

• Sharon Jones

  Research Experiences for Undergraduates

  84 shared

• Lee W. Clapp

  Idaho State University

  83 shared

• Donna E. Fennell

  Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

  83 shared

• Kristen Tull

  Lafayette College

  82 shared

• Tim La para

  Kansas State University

  81 shared

• Rao Y. Surampalli

  Institute for Global Environmental Strategies

  14 shared

• Wongee Kim

  Iowa State University

  13 shared

• Laura E. Christianson

  University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

  13 shared

Labs

• Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine Psychiatry and Behavioral MedicinePI