It is with great honor to announce that Dr. Navodi Jayarathne was selected as the Truog Soil Science Outstanding Dissertation Award Recipient. This award is given by the American Society of Agronomy (ASA), Crop Science Society of America (CSSA), and Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) to a PhD student whose dissertation is transformational in soil science research. Her Thesis title “Transport of Multi-Phase Multi-Component Fluids in the Shallow Subsurface Influenced by Soil and Surface Boundary Conditions: Experimental and Numerical Study with Application to Natural Gas Leakage” awarded her for the 2025 prize.
Dr. Jayarathne has made tremendous contributions to advancing knowledge and understanding in soil and hydrological processes as evidenced by her 4 peer reviewed publications, 3 news articles, 2 safety alerts and national and international presentations on her PhD work. And most importantly, her work has been translated to first responder practices that improve safety and leak detection.
Congratulations to CEE PhD student Navodi Jayarathne, who graduated from the Civil Engineering program. Her research focused on gas diffusivity of different soils including urban soils, agricultural soils, arctic soils (permafrost layer), and manufactured aggregated porous media with implications on infrastructure safety, greenhouse gas emissions, and terrestrial & outer space crop cultivation under different collaborations.
