McGovern has already received a Fulbright Science and Technology award to pursue PhD studies at MIT with Prof John Lienhard.
His PhD research, which aims to advance the state of the art in high recovery desalination systems, will be funded by Fulbright, an MIT Martin Fellowship and the IDA scholarship.
McGovern is aiming to extend the fraction of water economically recoverable from waste streams, through the development of new technology to deal with highly saline waters.