Team

Hosein Foroutan
Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Affiliate Faculty, Global Change Center & BIOTRANS

Office: 417 Durham Hall
Email: hosein@vt.edu
Phone: (540) 232-8400

Department Webpage
Google Scholar Profile

Ali Hossein Mardi
Postdoctoral Researcher
Email: alihmardi@vt.edu

Ali Joined the AIRFLows Lab in 2021 as a Postdoctoral Scholar. He has a Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering from the University of Arizona and an M.S. in Civil-Environmental Engineering from the Sharif University of Technology in Iran. His research interest is to study the formation, transport, and fate of aerosols in the atmosphere. Currently, he participates in an interdisciplinary study of Aeolian dust aerosols sourced from northern Africa and their ability to act as a medium for the transportation of microorganisms across the Atlantic.

Xinyue Huang
Postdoctoral Researcher
Email: xinyueh@vt.edu

Xinyue joined the AIRFlowS Lab as a Ph.D. student in 2019 and has continued as a postdoc since 2024. She earned her M.S. from Yale University and her B.S. from Tsinghua Univeristy, China, both in Environmental Engineering. Her research interest is to study the processes of air pollutants at the land-air interface and their impacts. Currently, she is working on improving the representation of nitrogen cycling in coupled agroecosystem and atmospheric models. Her doctoral research focused on wind-blown mineral dust.

Manu Nimmala
Ph.D. Student (Co-advised with Dr. Shane Ross, AOE) 
Email: nimmala@vt.edu

Manu joined the AIRFlowS and the Ross Dynamics Lab in 2019 as a Ph.D. student, after earning a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University. Her research is on fine-scale modeling of pollen transport from genetically-engineered crops.

Nishan Pokhrel
Ph.D. Student 
Email: nishan@vt.edu

Nishan joined the AIRFlowS Lab in 2021 as a Ph.D. student. He did his B.E. in Civil Engineering from Pulchowk Campus, Tribhuvan University, Nepal, and M.S. in Environmental Engineering from Virginia Tech. His previous research dealt with developing and using a direct-on-filter (DOF) Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) method to analyze coal mine dust samples to estimate different minerals present in the airborne dust. His current research work deals with improving the understanding of microplastics in the atmosphere.

Huan Yang
Ph.D. Student 
Email: yanghuan@vt.edu

Huan joined the AIRFlowS Lab in 2021 as a Ph.D. student. She has a B.E in Harbor and Coastal Engineering from Hohai University, China, and an M.S in Water Resources and Environmental Engineering from UCLA. Her current research focuses on water-sediment exchange and hydrodynamics process simulation in river networks using computational fluid dynamics.

Carrie Carpenter
Ph.D. Student (Co-advised with Dr. David Schmale, SPES) 
Email: clcarpenter@vt.edu

Carrie joined the AIRFlowS lab and the Schmale lab at the beginning of 2023 as a PhD student. She received her B.S. in biochemistry from Harrisburg University of Science and Technology in 2019. Carrie’s research focuses on the transport and interactions of microplastics colonized with microbes, investigating impacts on aerosolization and ice-nucleation ability.

Salahuddin Setu
Ph.D. Student 
Email: salahuddin@vt.edu

Salahuddin joined the AIRFlowS Lab in 2024 as a PhD student. He did his B.S. in Civil Engineering from the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), Bangladesh. His previous research dealt with greenhouse gas emissions and the transport of microplastics from landfills. His current research work focuses on the multiscale dynamic assessment of airborne microplastic emissions in tire wear particles.

Kaustuv Ray
Ph.D. Student 
Email: kaustuvr@vt.edu

Kaustuv joined the AIRFlowS Lab as a PhD student in 2024. He earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degree from the National Institute of Technology Rourkela, India, both in Mining Engineering with a minor in Mechanical Engineering. His research interests include studying the impacts of air pollution on climate change and vice-versa. Currently, he is working on modelling nitrogen emissions from the agricultural sector in the US. Outside of work, Kaustuv is very interested in outdoor activities like hiking, biking, and trail running.

Kelsey Kern
B.S. Student 
Email: kelseykern@vt.edu

Kelsey joined the AIRFlowS lab at the beginning of Summer 2023 as an undergraduate researcher in the “Solving Problems with Data Science” Summer REU. She is building upon this research while pursuing a B.S. in Biological Sciences. Kelsey’s current research includes designing experiments that sustain biofilm formation on microplastics and tire-wear particles while developing methods to quantify the observed bacterial growth.