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Lorelay Mendoza

Lorelay became passionate about the connections between water, health, and society while interning at the World Health Organization in Switzerland in 2019, and she has continued to explore those themes in her work ever since. Her doctoral research examined the fate of wastewater contaminants across multiple scales. Her projects have included evaluating failing onsite septic systems in rural Alabama, studying…
Julie Fasolas
December 4, 2025

Luke Presson

Luke received his B.S. in chemistry from Centre College and worked as an analytical chemist for three years before returning to graduate school. He then received his Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering from the University of Arizona in 2024. Luke’s research at Arizona was primarily focused on optimizing membrane distillation (MD) for potable water reuse in off-grid applications. Much of this…
Julie Fasolas
November 18, 2025

Radha Kamineni

Radha Kamineni (she/her) has a B.S. in Environmental Engineering from California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo and an M.S. in Environmental Engineering from University of California, Berkeley. As an undergraduate, she conducted research on the dissolution of the silicate mineral olivine in ocean water, using olivine-containing sediment collected from beaches in Hawaii. Her work focused on quantifying the adsorption of…
Julie Fasolas
September 10, 2025

Jessica Deng

Jessica has a M.S. in Environmental Data Science and a B.S. in Environmental Engineering from the University of Southern California. Prior to joining full-time Jessica did an internship with Trussell in which she developed a brochure for California’s direct potable reuse regulations and provided regulatory support to East Valley Water District. During her undergraduate degree, she participated in air pollution…
Julie Fasolas
September 3, 2025

Omar Hassan

Omar Hassan has a B.S in Civil and Environmental Engineering and an M.S. in Environmental Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley. During his undergraduate degree, he was a member of the Berkeley Water Center where he assisted with research on decentralized stormwater treatment. There, he tested the performance of different sorption and oxidation materials on the removal/degradation of…
Julie Fasolas
August 12, 2025

Matthew Demer

Matthew Demer has a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Davis. For his senior design project, he modeled existing and proposed alternative technologies for the recycling of air and water on the International Space Station. He has contributed to chemistry research on organometallic catalysis at The Scripps Research Institute, and on electrocatalytic conversion of carbon dioxide to…
Julie Fasolas
January 30, 2025

Michael Karish

Michael Karish is an associate engineer. He has a M.S. from UC Berkeley in environmental engineering and a B.S. from UC Berkeley in environmental engineering science. He previously did an internship with Trussell in which he worked on the day-to-day field work and the data analysis of a non-potable reuse pilot project for the East Bay Municipal Utility District. During…
Julie Fasolas
August 20, 2024

Marcus Lira

Marcus Lira has a B.S. in Environmental Engineering and an M.S. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. His master’s thesis focused on the recovery of winery wastewater for drip irrigation through the use of a bench-scale ultrafiltration membrane system. His research looked to determine if the UF effluent met regulation standards for crop…
Paula Moore
August 9, 2024

Sofia Martinez

Sofia Martinez has a B.S in Environmental Engineering from Drexel University. For her senior design project, she produced a sustainable landfill management strategy for a retired impoundment formerly belonging to DuPont, aiming to reduce the flow of groundwater through an unlined landfill and prevent leachate containing organic material from mobilizing naturally occurring arsenic in the soil. At Drexel’s chapter of…
Paula Moore
August 9, 2024

Owen Zuidema

Owen Zuidema (he/him) is an associate engineer at Trussell’s Oakland office with a background in Civil and Environmental Engineering, holding an M.S. from the University of California, Davis, and a B.S. from the University of California, Berkeley. With a passion for water resource management in California, Owen has experience in water treatment engineering, environmental research, and sustainable construction. At the…
Paula Moore
August 9, 2024