SHORT SUMMARY OF SCIENTIFIC LIFE

David Gabriel Buguña (Barcelona, 1971) scientific career began in 1994 when joined the Department of Chemical Engineering at the Autonomous University of Barcelona as assistant professor after having completed a degree in Industrial Chemistry. His PhD thesis was developed in the field of monitoring and control of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) using deterministic models, and was successfully defended in July 2000. Between April 2001 and September 2002, he joined the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, University of California, Riverside, as postdoctoral researcher under the supervision of Professor Marc A. Deshusses. Research at UCR focused on the study of the feasibility of redesigning industrial-scale chemical absorption towers to be used as biotrickling filters for treating gaseous effluents of WWTPs. In September 2002, he went back to GENOCOV-UAB and started up, in collaboration with Dr. Javier Lafuente (GENOCOV), a new research line in the Department of Chemical Engineering at UAB focused on the design, characterization, monitoring and control of bioreactors for the treatment of volatile organic compounds, ammonia and hydrogen sulfide present in gaseous emissions. This research was also unprecedented at UAB and practically a national pioneer. In 2005 he became Associate Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering at UAB and full-professor at the Department of Chemical, Biological and Environmental Engineering at UAB in 2019.
My research activities focus on the design, optimization, monitoring, control and modeling of biological processes, especially the intensification of wastewater and gas treatment and recovery systems. I have participated in 20 competitive projects between state and regional, 7 European projects within the fields of biotechnology and especially environmental engineering, having been principal investigator or coordinator in 9 national competitive projects funded under the state research plans and in a European project of the MSCA-RISE program with a total grant of € 1.56 million. I have been responsible for 9 research projects with companies and public institutions for a total funding of € 0.84 million. Throughout my career I have published 104 indexed articles in international journals, 2 books and 25 book chapters in the field of biological removal of water pollutants and waste gases. My current h-index is 32 (Scopus, 2021) and accumulated over 2750 citations. In addition, the results of my work have been presented in more than 120 presentations at conferences, mostly international. I have directed a total of 11 doctoral theses and I am currently directing 5 more. This experience led to the creation of Aeris Tecnologies Ambientals SL in 2009, a technology-based company of which I am a founding partner, and to being the Coordinator of the Gas Emissions Treatment Area of the BIOGLS Technology Center, a center for the Technological Network of Catalonia. I have participated in a total of 5 national and Catalan thematic networks related to wastewater and gas treatment technologies and I have participated as a member of the scientific committee in 5 international conferences. I am currently a member of the Technical Committee for Standardization CTN 100, ISO / TC 142 WG 13 Group for Biological Gas Treatment (AENOR) and a member of the International Water Association (IWA). I have been a project evaluator for various national and international agencies (ANEP, FONDECYT, NSF).

TOP TEN PUBLICATIONS

1. Gabriel D., Deshusses M.A. (2003). Retrofitting existing chemical scrubbers to biotrickling filters for H2S emission control. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 100 (11), 6308-6312.
2. Baquerizo G., Maestre J.P., Sakuma T., Deshusses M.A., Gamisans X., Gabriel D., Lafuente J. (2005). A detailed model of a biofilter for ammonia removal: model parameters analysis and model validation. Chemical Engineering Journal, 113, 205-214.
3. Fortuny M., Baeza J.A., Gamisans X., Casas C., Lafuente J., Deshusses M.A., Gabriel D. (2008). Biological Sweetening of Energy Gases Mimics in Biotrickling Filters. Chemosphere, 71, 10-17.
4. Montebello A.M., Fernández M., Almenglo F., Ramírez M., Cantero D., Baeza M., Gabriel D. (2012) Simultaneous methylmercaptan and hydrogen sulfide removal in the desulfurization of biogas in aerobic and anoxic biotrickling filters. Chemical Engineering Journal, 200-202, 237-246.
5. Gabriel D., Deshusses M.A., Gamisans X. (2013) Desulfurization of biogas in biotrickling filters 513-523. In: Air Pollution Prevention and Control: Bioreactors and Bioenergy. John Wiley and Sons, Ltd. ISBN: 978-1-1199-4331-0.
6. Dorado A. D.; Husni S.; Pascual G., Puigdellivol C., Gabriel D. (2014) Inventory and treatment of compost maturation emissions in a municipal solid waste treatment facility. Waste Management 34, 344-351.
7. Mora, M., Fernández, M., Gómez, J.M., Cantero D., Lafuente J., Gamisans X., Gabriel D. (2015) Kinetic and stoichiometric characterization of anoxic sulfide oxidation by SO-NR mixed cultures from anoxic biotrickling filters. Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology 99: 77-87.
8. Mora M., Lopez L.R., Lafuente J., Perez J., Kleerebezem R., van Loosdrecht M.C.M., Gamisans X., Gabriel D. (2016) Respirometric characterization of aerobic sulfide, thiosulfate and elemental sulfur oxidation by S-oxidizing biomass. Water Research, 89, 282-292.
9. Fernandez-Palacios, E; Lafuente, J; Mora, M; Gabriel, D. Exploring the performance limits of a sulfidogenic uasb during the long-term use of crude glycerol as electron donor. Sci. Total Environ. 688:1184-1192. (2019).
10. Guimera, X; Mora, M; Lopez, LR; Gabriel, G; Dorado, AD; Lafuente, J; Gamisans, X; Gabriel, D. (2020) Coupling dissolved oxygen microsensors measurements and heterogeneous respirometry for monitoring and modeling microbial activity within sulfide- oxidizing biofilms. Chem. Eng. J. 400:125846.

OTHER LINKS 

Additional research webpage: www.biofiltration.cat
Wordle: http://www.wordle.net/gallery?username=David%20Gabriel