Gully erosion has been established as a major source of sediment pollution in the upper Trinity River watershed in north-central Texas. This fact, along with a lack of models appropriate for a large-area gully erosion analysis established a need for a gully erosion study in the upper Trinity basin. This thesis project attempted to address this need by deriving an index indicative of gully erosion risk using remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) methodology. In context of previous field studies, the coarse spatial resolution of the input GIS data layers presented a challenge to prediction of gully prone areas. However, the remote sensing/GIS approach was found to provide useful reconnaissance information on gully risk over large areas.

With the advent of national storm water regulations, municipalities with populations greater than 100,000 are required to obtain National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Permits (NPDES) for storm water discharges. In addition to the sampling required for the permit process, the City of Fort Worth contracted with the University of North Texas' Institute of Applied Sciences to conduct acute toxicity testing using Pimephales prcmelas and Ceriodaphnia dubia on storm water samples received from the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. A Toxicity Identification Evaluation (TIE) was performed on four samples that exhibited acute toxicity to C. dubia. High levels of metals as well as diazinon were some of the probable toxicants found.

Wetland wastewater treatment offers low-cost, energy efficient alternatives to conventional wastewater technologies. In this study, an artificial wetland was constructed at the City of Denton, Texas Pecan Creek Water Reclamation Plant to facilitate diazinon removal from treated effluent.

This study evaluated the effects of chlorinated effluent discharged from the City of Denton, Texas' wastewater treatment plant on Pecan Creek's fish and macroinvertebrate assemblages, and their recovery upon dechlorination. A baseline of ecological conditions was established while chlorine was present in the effluent (June 1993- October 1993), and was evaluated again after dechlorination with sulfur dioxide (October 1993-August 1994). In situ Asiatic clam and fathead minnow ambient toxicity tests, and fish and macroinvertebrate collections were used to establish this baseline for comparison to post-dechlorination results.

The objective of this research was to determine if physical and microbial sediment characterizations could be used to explain benthic macroinvertebrate distribution in two branches of Lake Ray Roberts, Texas.

The problem of using a state adopted textbook written to apply to a large body of students with varying interests and needs was overcome by using a detailed syllabus that arranged course content in a meaningful sequence that appealed to student interest. The outlined syllabus prepared a two semester life science curriculum to be used by the teacher to guide lesson planning. Both semesters were divided into three units each. Materials included in the syllabus were given to actual student groups in real classroom settings. Since hands on learning was an important part of classroom instruction, two laboratory sections were included in the appendices to be used with the syllabus.