Audrey H Sawyer

Audrey Hucks Sawyer is an American hydrogeologist and Assistant Professor of Earth Science at Ohio State University. Her work has focused on quantifying the role of groundwater - surface water interactions in transporting nutrients, contaminants, and heat in rivers and coastal settings. Sawyer has won multiple awards, including the National Science Foundation CAREER Awardin 2018 and the Kohout Early Career Award in 2016.

In 2004 Audrey Sawyer graduated Summa Cum Laude from Rice University with a Bachelor of Science in Earth Science and Environmental Engineering. In 2007, Sawyer attended Pennsylvania State University, from which she received a Master of Science in Geoscience. Consequently, in 2011 Sawyer obtained her Doctor of Philosophy in Geological Science at University of Texas at Austin. Her thesis focused on the “Complexity in river-groundwater exchange due to permeability heterogeneity, in-stream flow obstacles, and river stage fluctuations."

Following her Doctoral degree, Sawyer worked as a Post Doctoral Researcher at the University of Delaware from 2011 until 2012. Subsequently, Sawyer was hired as an Assistant Professor of Earth and Environmental sciences at University of Kentucky from 2012 until 2014. Following this, Sawyer became an Assistant Professor of Earth Science at Ohio State University from 2014 to present. Sawyer's work focuses on analyzing the surface - groundwater interactions in rivers and coastal settings in order to quantify the level of contaminants, nutrients, and heat being transported between these bodies of water. She uses field observations, controlled laboratory column experiments, and computer models to study surface and groundwater content.

Sawyer is member of the American Geophysical Union and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She is also an Officer at the Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science Incorporated. Sawyer has been the lead investigator of research done for the United States Geological Survey during 2014 and 2017. The focus of each of these researches have been "Use of time-lapse electrical resistivity to image solute transport in a karst conduit" (Start Date: 2014-03-01 End Date: 2015-02-28) and "Quantifying direct groundwater discharge to Lake Erie and vulnerability to hidden nutrient loads" (Start Date: 2017-03-01 End Date: 2018-02-28) respectively.

Sawyer has both led and collaborated in over 30 publications between 2009 and 2019.

Sawyer's work has been published by multiple journals, such as Water Resources Research, Geophysical Research Letters, Journal of Geophysical Research: Bio-geosciences section, and Oceans section. In addition to this, she has been published by Journal of Hydrology, GroundWater Journal, as well as the scientific journals supported by the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Sawyer's most cited work are as follows:

• Audrey Hucks Sawyer; M Bayani Cardenas "Hyporheic flow and residence time distributions in heterogeneous cross‐bedded sediment" (2009) (123 citations)
• Audrey Hucks Sawyer; M Bayani Cardenas; Ashleigh Bomar; Meredith Mackey "Impact of dam operations on hyporheic exchange in the riparian zone of a regulated river" (2009) (118 citations)
• Audrey H Sawyer, M Bayani Cardenas, Jim Buttles "Hyporheic exchange due to channel‐spanning logs" (2011) (84 citations)
• Sawyer, A.H. ; C.H. David, and J.S. Famiglietti"Continental patterns of submarine groundwater discharge reveal coastal vulnerabilities" (2016)
• Corey D. Wallace; Audrey H. Sawyer; Rebecca T. Barnes "Spectral analysis of continuous redox data reveals geochemical dynamics near the stream-aquifer interface" (2018)
• Sawyer, A.H., H.A. Michael, and A.W. Schroth "From soil to sea: the role of groundwater in coastal critical zone processes" (2016)
• Robert E. Danczak; Audrey H. Sawyer; Kenneth H. Williams; James C. Stegen; Chad Hobson; Michael J. Wilkins "Seasonal hyporheic dynamics control coupled microbiology and geochemistry in Colorado River sediments" (2016)
• Pryshlak, T.T.*, A.H. Sawyer, S.H. Stonedahl, and M.R. Soltanian "Multiscale hyporheic exchange through strongly heterogeneous sediments" (2015)

Sawyer's most cited research focused on "Hyporheic flow and residence time distributions in heterogeneous cross‐bedded sediment" (2009). This study quantified how the permeability of cross beds influence the ground-water and river bed water exchange, also referred as the hyporheic exchange. This research concluded that permeability heterogeneity of cross-bedded sediment influences the path and residence times of hyporheic exchange.

One of the most noted research led by Sawyer focused on analyzing the content of dissolved contaminants in groundwater discharge around the coastline of the United States in 2016. The analysis displayed the hotspots for contaminant discharge into marine waters, which allowed researchers to map out cities and areas at risk. Results displayed that more than one-fifth of the coastline waters are susceptible to contamination coming from groundwater discharge. Consequences are coastal dead zones, toxic algae bloom, contamination of underground freshwater aquifers in specific coastal locations around the United States. In an interview with UsaToday, Sawyer noted, “We hope others will use our analysis to better plan strategies for coastal land development and groundwater management that help preserve water quality.” “Right now, we’ve created a map of American coastlines that highlights some previously known as well as unknown areas of vulnerability along the U.S. coastline, but we hope to be able to do it for the world shortly, as data become available,” she added.

Another noted research Sawyer performed was the "Spectral analysis of continuous redox data reveals geochemical dynamics near the stream-aquifer interface", with which she was granted the National Science Foundation CAREER Awardin 2018. This collective research sought to understand how groundwater chemistry evolves in response to water table fluctuations over a range of timescales. The investigators used field observations, controlled laboratory column experiments, and computer models in order to quantify the movement of reactive solutes such as oxygen, nitrate, iron, and manganese beneath a fluctuating water table. Results have been used to increase the understanding of dynamic changes in both groundwater and river water quality, all for the management of these water resources.

• National Science Foundation CAREER Award(2018)
• Kohout Early Career Award given by Geological Society of America’s Hydrology Division (2016)
• American Geophysical Union Editor’s Choice Award for Excellence in Refereeing in Geophysical Research Letters (2015)
• American Geophysical Union Editor’s Choice Award for Excellence in Refereeing in Water Resources Research (2014)
• American Geophysical Union Horton Research Grant recipient (2009)

Sawyer received the Kohout Early Career Award in 2016 from the Geological Society of America’s Hydrology Division. "The award will be presented to a distinguished early career scientist for outstanding achievement in contributing to the Hydrogeological profession through original research and service, and for the demonstrated potential of continued excellence throughout their career."

Furthermore, she was awarded the National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 2018. This award was given to her for her research done on "Spectral analysis of continuous redox data reveals geochemical dynamics near the stream-aquifer interface". The grant awarded will also help establish a hydrogeology learning lab at Mirror Lake, in the middle of Ohio State's campus. This learning lab contains of monitoring stations in both the lake and a groundwater well. Each is equipped with wireless sensors to monitor pressure, water level, temperature, electric conductivity, total dissolved solids and salinity. In 2019, Sawyer appeared on Great Lakes Now to discuss the importance of groundwater as a drinking water source in the Midwest.