EnViroLab: The Environmental Virology Laboratory at Michigan State University

Welcome to EnViroLab where we love working on water quality and public health issues. We study: 1) environmental surveillance approaches for identification and prediction of outbreaks; 2) the fate of viruses and other pathogens in natural systems and in the built environment; 3) virus inactivation and removal by water treatment processes. Our research has been funded by the US National Science Foundation (NSF); the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS); the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE); the Great Lakes Water Authority (GLWA); the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA); the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS); the Water Research Foundation (WRF), the Water Environmental Research Foundation (WERF), and other organizations.

Principal Investigator: Irene Xagoraraki, PhD, Professor of Environmental Engineering, 

William J. Beal Outstanding Faculty, Michigan State University

Dr. Irene Xagoraraki is a Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Michigan State University. She earned her Ph.D. and MS degrees in Environmental Engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her BS degree in Environmental Studies from the University of the Aegean in Greece. At Michigan State University she teaches “Basic Principles of Environmental Engineering and Science”, “Environmental Engineering Laboratory Methods”, “Water Quality and Public Health”, and “Physicochemical Processes in Environmental Engineering”. She has authored multiple peer-reviewed scientific journal publications and book and encyclopedia chapters. Her research has been covered by news organizations such as the New York Times, BBC and others. For her research related to environmental virology, she received awards by the US Environmental Protection Agency (2018) and by the American Society of Civil Engineers (2021 and 2022). In 2020 her wastewater surveillance work for early detection of viral outbreaks was featured in Women in Engineering and Science: Investigations by Prominent Female Engineers, Springer Nature, Switzerland. In 2022 she was featured in the Smithsonian: Stories of Women in STEM. In 2023 she received the William J. Beal Outstanding Faculty Award at Michigan State University.