HDC SETAC Board of Directors 2022 Election Results 

Board Members

Gina Ferreira USEPA Region 2

Gina Ferreira works in USEPA Region 2’s Land, Chemicals, and Redevelopment Division (LCRD) serving as the sole human health and ecological risk assessor for all the division’s programs mainly the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) and TSCA PCBs.   She provides risk assessment technical assistance to RCRA sites in New Jersey and New York as well as Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.  Some high-profile sites that she is working on in the HDC-SETAC area include Chemours (former DuPont) Pompton Lakes Works, Chemours (former DuPont) Chambers Works/Deepwater, Exxon Bayway Refinery, Chevron Perth Amboy, and Picatinny Arsenal. Gina is also working on risk assessment issues related to compliance averaging and TPH fractionation and several Office of Research and Development (ORD) projects related to incorporating ecosystem services into the hazardous waste site remedial process. For HDC-SETAC, Gina began as a Board Member in 2007, acted as Vice President in 2009 and subsequently served as President and Past President, and started as the Secretary in 2012. An example of an overlap of her EPA work and SETAC occurred in 2016 when a paper that she co-authored titled Ecosystem Services as Assessment Endpoints for Ecological Risk Assessment as part of a HQ Risk Assessment Forum’s ORD Technical Panel was published in the SETAC journal “Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management.”  The article provides risk assessors and remedial managers a method to present further justification for taking actions to protect environmental resources based on benefits to humans.

Ying Wang, Ph.D., WSP USA Solutions Inc.

I am a lead geochemist and technical principal at WSP USA, where I serve as a technical task leader for several large Superfund contaminated sediment sites (e.g., Upper Hudson River, Lower Hudson River, Lower Passaic River, Newark Bay, and Newtown Creek). I hold a Ph.D. degree in Physical Chemistry. My professional experience covers a broad range of environmental investigation and remediation work, from ambient air quality monitoring and health effect assessment to groundwater transport modeling, sediment investigation and remediation. As a geochemist at WSP, my work has been focusing on applying various statistical methods to support remedial investigation, feasibility study, sampling design, remedial design, and environmental pollution forensics at contaminated sediment sites. I have authored or co-authored 27 peer-reviewed publications with over 6,000 citations. I am an active member of the Interstate Technology Regulatory Council (ITRC) PFAS team where I helped updating the AFFF section of ITRC PFAS guidance document.

I have been involved in HDC SETAC since 2016. I have given one platform presentation in 2019 Spring meeting and one short course in 2022 Spring meeting. I will also give a presentation at the 2022 SETAC North America conference. I am particularly interested in sharing my experience in environmental chemistry and statistics. I like what HDC SETAC has offered to the scientific community, particularly the professional networking opportunities. I would like to serve as a Board member to support HDC SETAC’s mission in promoting research and supporting students. I would also be happy to assist with meetings and networking events as well as help increase the visibility of HDC SETAC within the region.

Student Representative

Anthony Sigman-Lowery, University of Delaware
I am a PhD Candidate at the University of Delaware, and I am interested in joining the HDC SETAC board as a student representative because my research interests align with your mission, and I believe that my community-building talents will be an asset to the board.
I am studying the fate and behavior of novel brominated flame retardants in aquatic environments. My research will be the first to experimentally investigate their dissolved organic matter and octanol-water partitioning properties as well as their historic deposition in Arctic sediments and presence in freshwater plankton. This research aligns with the mission of HDC SETAC, as understanding the physicochemical properties, distribution, and bioavailability of emerging contaminants is critical to evaluating their environmental toxicity and informing potential regulation. Additionally, I am one of the founding members of UD’s Queer & Trans Graduate Student Union. As co-chair, I have overseen the growth of our membership to almost 200 members, partnered with student organizations and departments on social and educational events, and advocated for more LGBTQ+ inclusive policies across the graduate college. This leadership role has provided me with significant experience as a community and event organizer, which I believe will be vital to the role of growing student membership and developing and executing student activities. HDC SETAC represents an amazing opportunity for students to meet a diverse range of environmental professionals, discover potential career pathways, and learn how their research can actually impact the world. I would be honored to join the board as a student representative and lend my skills to this mission.