Meet Becky. She’s conducting doctoral research on how nanomaterials impact aquatic organisms at the UW-Milwaukee School of Freshwater Sciences in the lab of Dr. Rebecca Klaper. Becky went back to school after a long track record working in sustainability, including for the City of Milwaukee to support its recycling programs. But she chased her life’s dream to do research in aquatic science.

Becky got an undergraduate degree in biology with a focus in ecology. During a conservation biology course, she learned about a whole host of environmental problems people are causing. “I wanted to take that and not get upset about it, but use that as motivation to have a career in sustainability that could help to do something about it.” She pursued the opportunity to study in Sweden and earned a master’s degree in international environmental sciences with a focus in sustainability. Then she moved to Milwaukee and worked with the city’s recycling program. “It was very exciting for me to be working in a position where I could help promote sustainability in the community.”

At the same time, she wanted to connect her passion for sustainability with her indelible love of aquatic life—fostered as a young girl when she explored the creatures living in her grandparents’ pond. Excited about the environmental health implications of Dr. Klaper’s research, Becky reached out and soon found a place working in her lab. “It really is a dream come true,” she says.

Becky is currently studying the cellular impacts of lithium cobalt oxide (LCO) nanosheets on zebrafish, tiny crustaceans, and aquatic flies called chironomids. (Fishermen may know chironomids as the midges that are sometimes used to bait fish hooks.) LCO is found in lithium-ion batteries—like those in our phones, laptops, and even electric vehicles. The potential impacts are of concern because there is not currently a widespread way to easily recycle lithium-ion batteries the way there is for lead-acid batteries. So Becky is looking at the potential impacts of spent battery waste from lithium-ion batteries on aquatic life if it leaches out of landfills and into the water.

Becky’s research delves deeper with special “omics” techniques to examine how the LCO is disrupting what she describes as the “cellular machinery” inside the zebrafish, crustaceans, and chironomids. By examining how nanomaterials impact organisms at the cellular level, we can begin to understand what is really happening when an organism is exposed to a contaminant. This knowledge is critical to informing how to redesign the nanomaterials, and also how to regulate, mitigate, or manage products that use nanomaterials—like lithium-ion batteries—when they reach the end of their design lifespan.

In the case of LCO, Becky found that it’s disrupting important systems that these organisms need to stay healthy—and for their populations to thrive. Studying species that are widely used in the testing of chemical safety, and important for healthy freshwater ecosystems, helps us to make connections about the potential impacts of different chemicals. That makes the zebrafish, crustaceans, and chironomids Becky studies in Dr. Klaper’s lab aquatic “canaries in the coalmine.”

Another arena Becky is exploring involves nanomaterials used as “micronutrients.” Copper is an example. Agriculture depends on crops receiving nutrients at the right amounts and the right times. Since many crop plants need only a small amount of copper, applying the right dose of copper nanoparticles is of agricultural interest as it could reduce costs for farmers. Becky’s research considers how these nanomaterials might enter aquatic systems through runoff and what potential impacts they could have on aquatic life.

Nanomaterials hold great promise for myriad applications beneficial to society, Becky notes, but she and other scientists at SFS are working to understand the potential for toxic unintended consequences when these tiny substances—100,000 times smaller than a human hair—get out into our aquatic environment. They are not alone. Their efforts are part of the National Science Foundation’s Center for Sustainable Nanotechnology, an interdisciplinary network of researchers considering different nanomaterials questions.

After earning her doctorate at the UW-Milwaukee School of Freshwater Sciences, a one-day Dr. Becky Curtis would love to work as an ecotoxicologist—whether at a university, government agency, or other research institution.