Graduate Studies In Water Resources Engineering

The Water Resources Program in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering has long been a leader in innovative approaches to understanding and solving water problems, both in scholarly and practical terms. Moreover, the program is located at a University specializing in water and environmental studies in a state with pressing water problems.

The UCD program provides an advanced education in water resource problems and problem-solving approaches and offers students an opportunity to conduct research in water resources engineering. The program includes areas of concentration in water quality, hydrology, mixing processes in natural systems, computational hydraulics, groundwater, modeling, and water resources planning and management. In each area, graduate students learn existing methods and advance the state of the art. The department has a growing range of modern field and laboratory equipment. Students also have access to modern computing laboratories. The Sacramento metropolitan region (a 20 minute drive), is one of the world's largest centers for water resources engineering. Sacramento, the capital of California, is the managerial center of the following federal and state water projects: the Central Valley Project (CVP), the State Water Project (SWP), regional offices of the Federal Bureau of Reclamation, Corps of Engineers, USGS, Western Area Power Administration (hydropower), and also houses the state's impressive environmental and water regulatory agencies. Nearby San Francisco Bay supplies additional resources and amenities, providing exposure to real-world water resource problems and problem-solving.

In addition, the department has a long history of cooperation with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Hydrologic Engineering Center (HEC) which is located in Davis. HEC in coordination with UC Davis Civil & Environmental Engineering offers an intership program for funding new students.

Research Groups

Faculty

Bombardelli, Fabian A.
Assistant Professor

fabombardelli@ucdavis.edu
(530) 752-0949

 Computational fluid mechanics, computational hydraulics, environmental fluid dynamics, multiphase flows, turbulence, open-channel resistance.

Ginn, Timothy R.
Professor

trginn@ucdavis.edu
(530) 752-1707

Mathematical modeling of subsurface fate and transport processes; Reactive solute transport in heterogeneous media; Scaling nonlinear/multicomponent omponent reaction; Experimentation in subsurface bioremediation and bacterial transport; Mathematical methods for paleoclimate reconstruction

Kavvas, M. Levent
Professor

mlkavvas@ucdavis.edu
(530) 752-2518

Hydrology ; Hydrometeorology, hydraulic modeling, erosion modeling; Stochastic pollution transport modeling; Stochastic methods

Lund, Jay R.
Professor

jrlund@ucdavis.edu
(530) 752-5671

Systems analysis in water resources and environment planning and management ; Resource economics ; Regional water supply and resource management

Marinño, Miguel A.
Professor

mamarino@ucdavis.edu
(530) 752-0586

Groundwater hydrology and contamination ; Optimization and simulation of water resources systems; Irrigation planning and management

Schladow, S. Geoffrey
Associate Professor

gschladow@ucdavis.edu
(530) 752-6932

Lake and reservoir modeling ; Water quality in natural water bodies ; Environmental fluid mechanics ; Ecosystem modeling ; Sediment-water column exchange processes ; Saline lakes

Schoellhamer, Dave
Adjunct Associate Professor

dschoell@att.bi.com

Water Resources Engineering

Younis, Bassam A.
Professor

bayounis@ucdavis.edu
(530) 754-6417

Computational Hydraulics; Turbulence modeling for complex shear flows;LES and Unsteady RANS for vortex shedding and its control; Sedimenttransport; Industrial aerodynamics.

 

Courses

The Water Resources Engineering area also is supported by courses offered by the Department of Land Air and Water Resources.  Courses offered in support of the graduate program in Water resources Engineering include:

  • ECI 212 A - Finite Element Procedures in Applied Mechanics
  • ECI 244 - Environmental Quality Modeling
  • ECI 245 - Applied Environmental Chemistry
  • ECI 260 - Non-cohesive Sediment Transportation
  • ECI 261 - Cohesive Particle Transportation
  • ECI 266 A - Applied Stochastic Methods in Engineering
  • ECI 266 B - Applied Stochastic Methods in Engineering
  • ECI 267 - Water Resources Management
  • ECI 268 - Public Works Economics
  • ECI 270 - Advanced Water Resources Management
  • ECI 272A - Advanced Hydrogeology: Flow
  • ECI 272B - Advanced Hydrogeology: Transport
  • ECI 272C Advanced Hydrogeology: Reactive and Contaminant Transport
  • ECI 273 - Water Resource Systems Engineering
  • ECI 274 - Hydraulics of Pipe Lines
  • ECI 275 - Hydrologic Time-Series Analysis
  • ECI 276 - Watershed Hydrology
  • ECI 277A - Computational River Mechanics I
  • ECI 277B - Computational River Mechanics II
  • ECI 277C - Turbulence and Mixing Processes
  • ECI 278 - Hydrodynamics
  • ECI 279 - Advanced Mechanics of Fluids
  • EC1 290 - Seminar

Graduate seminars and lectures by visiting scholars supplement formal courses.