Silvina Di Pietro (Chemistry)
Silvina A. Di Pietro graduated from Florida International University in the fall of 2012 with a Bachelor of Science in chemistry. After working as a middle school science teacher and a chemistry tutor at Broward College, she decided to start graduate school in the fall of 2015. She is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in environmental chemistry.
As an undergraduate at FIU, she was part of the Honors College, which allowed her to graduate with honors. In the summer of 2011, she participated in the Honors College research-service study abroad program to the Peruvian Amazon. She was a member of the American Chemical Society (ACS) Chemistry Club, Photography Club, and Italian Club. She worked as a Chemistry Learning assistant for two semesters, tutoring general chemistry to fellow FIU students. In her undergraduate research, she worked under Dr. Cai and his group at the Environmental Bioinorganic Chemistry Laboratory (EBCL), doing research on total mercury and its content in U.S. commercial rice.
Her professional interests include soil and water chemistry, geochemistry, climate change, and remediation of contaminated areas.
DOE Related Projects
Silvina joined FIU’s Applied Research Center (ARC) as a Department of Energy (DOE) Fellow and Graduate Research Assistant under the mentorship of Dr. Yelena Katsenovich and Dr. Hilary Emerson. Silvina is currently tasked with assisting in the development of the ammonia injection project. The project task is titled, “Subtask 1.3.1: Investigation of NH3 partitioning in bicarbonate-bearing media.” This ammonia injection remediation technique has the potential to treat and remove inorganic contaminants. One particular contaminant of concern is uranium which is found in the vadose zone at the DOE Hanford Site in Washington State.