Diana Karwan

Associate Professor
Director of Graduate Studies: Water Resources Science
dlkarwan@umn.edu
(612) 624-2774
301G Green Hall

2005 Upper Buford Circle
St Paul, MN 55108
United States

Water Resources Science
Education

Ph.D. 2010, Yale University, School of Forestry and Environmental Studies

External Affiliations

Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Soil, Water, and Climate

Associate, Institute on the Environment

Courses taught
Hydrology and Watershed Management
Forest Hydrology and Watershed Biogeochemistry

Areas of Interest

Hydrology, water science, and water quality.

Biography

My research and teaching focus on hydrology and watershed physical and chemical processes. More specifically, I investigate how variations in climate, landscapes, and land use drive physical, chemical, and ecological transport processes in watersheds, with emphasis on the movement of fine suspended sediments, associated contaminants, and particulate organic material. My approach strongly relies on field sampling and field-scale experiments, laboratory analyses, and numerical and statistical models. To this end, I employ a series of hydrologic, geochemical, and statistical tools to track watershed processes.

Teaching

Through teaching, I provide fundamental water science knowledge that allows students to grow their understanding in several aspects of basic and applied sciences. The foundation of my teaching is designed to achieve three goals: (1) foster students’ critical thinking skills, (2) encourage increased fundamental knowledge for each student regardless of their starting point, and (3) increase proficiency in scientific writing.

Research

As a hydrologist, my research centers on the movement of water and waterborne materials on and near the surface of the earth, or in the Critical Zone. My approach uses outflows of the landscape, the stream or river, as an integrated signal of the connected landscape’s and stream’s overall health. I use field observations, sample collection, and long-term watershed data with statistical models to examine the movement of water, soil, sediment, and solutes in response to changes in land cover, vegetation, climate, and extreme storm events in order to protect water quality and assess watershed health. Through my scholarship, I identify combinations of land cover, geology, and climate particularly prone to water quality threats and the conditions under which these threats emerge. In particular, I develop and utilize novel combinations of chemical and water fingerprinting in conjunction with time series water quantity and quality data to assess overall watershed health and its resilience to changing vegetation and land cover, as well as weather and climate conditions.

Select Publications

Dr. Diana Karwan's on Google Scholar Profile