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When Abigail Matheny learned she had been selected as an ARCS Scholar, the first person she called was her grandmother. Matheny, an environmental graduate student at the University of Minnesota, was thrilled by the recognition. The two-year award totals $10,000 and can be spent as Matheny chooses. In addition to the monetary award, Matheny will benefit from opportunities in mentoring and networking.

The ARCS award holds additional significance for Abigail Matheny. Her grandmother, Thea Stover, was a founding member of the ARCS chapter in Pittsburgh, which was chartered in 2003. Matheny grew up in Pittsburgh and is close to her grandmother. She has memories of sleepovers with chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast and trips to the science museum. Matheny’s grandmother talked to her about ARCS and the Scholars they sponsored. Matheny knew what an honor it was to be an ARCS Scholar. 

“That connection makes this award especially meaningful to me,” says Matheny.

Matheny and five other University of Minnesota graduate students were honored at the ARCS Scholar Award ceremony in November 2025 at the St. Paul Campus of the University of Minnesota.

Matheny thinks that in another time, her grandmother might have pursued scientific research. Matheny describes her grandmother as smart, outgoing, involved, and curious -- traits put to good use in her career as an elementary school teacher.  Her grandmother sent Matheny a vintage ARCS scarf to celebrate the ARCS award.

Matheny’s passion for environmental protection grew as she began to understand Pittsburgh’s long history of pollution. 

“I developed a strong interest in its consequences,” explains Matheny, “and a strong desire to mitigate such contamination for the health of both the human and natural worlds.” 

Prior to beginning her research at the University of Minnesota, Matheny spent nine months studying and researching water quality and pollution in Peru on a Fulbright Research award by the Fulbright U.S. Student Program, which provides scholarships for American postgraduate students to study or perform research in a different country. 

At the University of Minnesota, Matheny studies cyanobacteria, which are present in all aquatic environments and have been on Earth for billions of years. In particular conditions, cyanobacteria can experience considerable growth and give rise to harmful algal blooms. These blooms are expected to increase with climate change, leading to changes in the composition of dissolved organic matter (DOM) in natural waters. She notes that few studies have investigated how future increases in these cyanobacterial blooms would change how pollutants or toxins degrade in water. 

The main objectives of her research project are to understand both cyanobacteria and how environments are changing. 

“If we can quantitatively express future trends in surface water photochemistry,” says Matheny, “we can increase the accuracy of our models and facilitate robust decision making in the face of a rapidly changing climate. My research outcomes will provide evidence to support emerging environmental regulations and remediation strategies for the treatment of water contaminated with cyanobacteria and the harmful cyanotoxins they produce.” 

Understanding how harmful algal blooms affect our natural waters is important for the protection of all waters and water users. 

Anyone’s grandmother would be proud of that.

This article was adapted from an article published by the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Geo-Engineering at the University of Minnesota

Learn more about Matheny and her research: https://minnesota.arcsfoundation.org/scholars/current-scholars-4