Research emphasis is placed on environmental chemistry and soil physical chemistry. Recent projects dealing with environmental chemistry include emissions of ammonia from swine lagoons; temporal and spatial patterns in ambient ammonia and ammonium aerosol concentrations across eastern North Carolina; a nitrogen budget for the Coastal Plain river basins of North Carolina using a Geographical Information System (GIS); dry deposition of ammonia and ammonium aerosols to crop and woodland canopies; the trace metal content of fertilizer source materials produced in North America; and the issue of whether perchlorate is present in fertilizer source materials and fertilizer blends produced and marketed in North America.

Research projects dealing with soil physical chemistry currently include the use of simulants to determine the fate and transport of chemical warfare agents in soils; and an investigation of the redox chemistry of swine lagoons. Other research interests include modeling of solute-surface interactions in soil, application of chemical speciation models to soil systems, and characterization of the root-soil interface.