About
Siddhartha Roy’s environmental sciences and engineering research group is housed within the Department of Environmental Sciences at Rutgers University. The team focuses broadly on water quality and treatment, corrosion science, lead (Pb) exposure, environmental epidemiology, and global development.
Roy and his Virginia Tech team’s scientific and humanitarian relief work, with residents of Flint, Michigan, helped uncover the Flint Water Crisis using citizen science, open data sharing, field sampling, investigative journalism, and social media. These efforts led to the declaration of a “Public Health Emergency” by President Obama, garnered over $1.3 billion in relief, and informed the 2018 MI Lead and Copper Rule, the 2021 $1 Trillion federal Infrastructure Bill (H.R. 3684), and the 2024 US EPA Lead and Copper Rule Improvements.
Roy’s work has been discussed in The New York Times, BBC World Service, and the PBS® NOVA documentary “Poisoned Water,” and his TED talk “Science in service to the public good” has been viewed over 1.6 million times worldwide. His team’s recent and current undertakings include supervising routine and disaster-related water quality investigations in underserved communities, post-industrial cities, and public schools in the United States, West Africa, and Southeast Asia; conducting research on water infrastructure corrosion, impacts of contaminated water on the health, educational and psychological outcomes in pregnant women, young children, and vulnerable populations; engineering and policy fixes to reduce the occurrence of contaminated water and lead exposure globally; and executive producing documentaries and podcasts to enhance public understanding of science.
Roy received a Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering with advisor Dr. Marc Edwards from Virginia Tech, where he was the 2017 Graduate Student of the Year. His work has won prizes and recognition from the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Society of Civil Engineers, the American Water Works Association, the Boston Globe, the International Water Association, and the Obama Foundation.
Contact: 59 Dudley Rd, Lab 308, New Brunswick, NJ 08901; https://roy.rutgers.edu; roy[dot]s[at]rutgers[dot]edu; 848-932-5780.
Twitter: @siddharthaxroy
ORCiD: 0000-0001-6443-1393
Substack: Because
taskforce, scientific cohort, and center memberships
US Environmental Protection Agency Board of Scientific Counsellors: Social and Community Science subcommittee.
NJ Department of Environmental Protection Science Advisory Board: Water Quality and Quantity Committee.
Philadelphia Regional Center for Children’s Environmental Health Member at the University of Pennsylvania and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
GeoCAFÉ Scholar at the NSF-funded Boston University’s Center for Climate & Health Research Coordination Network.
IDEAAL DR2 Disaster Research Response Fellow at the NIEHS-funded University of Washington’s Center for Disaster Resilient Communities
New Jersey Institute for Food, Nutrition & Health, Rutgers Environmental Influences on Food, Nutrition and Health Taskforce.
The Obama Foundation Leaders USA cohort.
STAT News and The Boston Globe Wunderkind.
US Water Study research team at Virginia Tech (Founding Member).
profiles
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2023): Safe Water for All
STAT News (2021): Lessons from a Flint water crisis researcher about building trust in science during the pandemic
International Water Association (2021): Influential scientist wins IWA Young Leadership Award
American Institute of Chemical Engineers (2016): Pursuing Science for the Public Good