Researcher of the Month

Dr. Gary Parker

Gary Parker has recently been hired at the University of Illinois, and is affiliated with CWACES. His expertise is river morphodynamics, the study of how river bedforms and morphology are created through the interaction of water and sediment. He arrived at UIUC this past fall (2005), with a 75% appointment in Civil Engineering, and a 25% appointment in Geology, where he is the W.H. Johnson Professor. Dr. Parker brings a wealth of experience and expertise to UIUC and CWACES, and has pursued a 30-year career in academia before arriving.

Dr. Parker received his B.S. from Johns Hopkins University in Mechanics and Materials Science, with an area major in Science and Mathematics. After graduating and spending some time outside academe, Dr. Parker realized he wanted to study rivers, and subsequently applied to graduate school. He was admitted directly to the Ph.D. program at the University of Minnesota, to pursue research on river meandering. Following matriculation of his Ph.D. (December 1974), he worked as a post-doctoral associate for about 9 months at the Agricultural Research Service, before accepting a position in Civil Engineering at the University of Alberta, where he remained from 1975 to 1980. At Alberta, Dr. Parker said there were a large number of very talented people, both engineers and geomorphologists, exploring the various facets of rivers and working together on collaborative projects. It is at the University of Alberta that he realized the value of cross-discipline collaboration to help solve research problems. Then, in 1980, he moved to the St. Anthony Falls Laboratory, in the Engineering department at the University of Minnesota, where he remained until his departure for UIUC. At Minnesota, he continued his cross-discipline collaborations, forming relationships with personnel in the Geology department.

Dr. Parker has been heavily involved in research throughout his career. The problems that he has chosen to explore have combined his own curiosities with questions posed to him by members of society. He likes to have a mix of basic and applied research, as there is a benefit to be involved with both. Often, this has taken the form of basic research that has been employed to help solve applied problems. Dr. Parker said that his best basic research has had practical applied applications within 5 years. After delving into a problem, and examining it for a time, other projects often begin to form as by-products of the original, which have become collaborative efforts with students he has advised through the years. The amount of research Dr. Parker has done is extensive. However, select topics he has investigated through the years have included meandering submarine channels, subaqueous debris flows, the dynamics of sand-bed and gravel-bed rivers, flow dynamics, and reservoir sediment sluicing, among many others.

Presently, Dr. Parker is pursuing several research projects on morphodynamics. One aspect of his research effort in the coming years will focus on submarine sedimentation, submarine canyon formation, and delta formation. Another area of research has focused on the morphodynamics of dam removal and river restoration, and he plans continuing work in this area in the future. His work is not necessarily limited to planet Earth, either. Dr. Parker has recently been studying the transport of water ice sediment by newly discovered rivers of methane on Titan, for which two new papers should be forthcoming. In addition to these efforts, Dr. Parker desires to learn more about rivers in Illinois and their associated problems.

Dr. Parker is thrilled to be part of the exciting opportunity and the umbrella that CWACES provides. He believes that CWACES will provide a framework within which researchers, including hydrologists, chemists, geologists and sedimentologists, among others, can collaborate on research issues pertaining to water, providing new research insights. He also feels that CWACES will benefit graduate students studying water-related issues. As many faculty members who are studying water will be under one umbrella, it should provide an easy framework for students to form thesis and dissertation committees.

With his lifelong interest in studying rivers, it is no surprise that Dr. Parker now lives along the Sangamon River, near Mahomet.