Prof. D. N. Singh

SUSMITA SHARMA

Ph. D.
Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Powai, India susmita.sharma4@gmail.com

CHARACTERIZATION OF SEDIMENTS FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Sediments are the particulate matter that get transported by flow of water and eventually get deposited at the bottom of water bodies such as oceans, rivers, lakes, lagoons located at sewage treatment plants. The deposition of these materials, due to continued intervention of natural as well as anthropogenic activities, is a serious concern as the storage capacity (or health) of the system gets reduced/affected. Keeping in view the emerging challenges associated with proper disposal and subsequent utilization of sediments, as a manmade resource for sustainable development, their extraction from such locations becomes necessary. Hence, it is essential to characterize the sediments for devising strategies to exploit them, as a manmade resource, in the best possible manner. With this in view, efforts were made to characterize sediments from various depositional environments for their physical, chemical, morphological, mineralogical, toxicological and microbial characteristics, with an intention to assess their potential as a substitute material to natural resources.