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Ann Johnson
Assistant Professor of History and Philosophy
University of South Carolina

Talk Title: Ethics between Nanoscience and Nanotechnology: Making Space for a Discussion

Biographical Sketch
Professor Johnson, who holds a joint appoint with the Departments of History and Philosophy at the University of South Carolina, earned her Ph.D in the History of Science from Princeton University. She regularly teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on the history and philosophy of science and technology, and engineering ethics. Her first book, Designing ABS: Engineering Culture and the Production of Knowledge, will appear in 2007 with Duke University Press, and it details the design and development of Antilock braking systems for passenger cars from the 1950s through the 1970s. In 2003 she turned her attention to nanotechnology, focusing particularly on the role of computing in the development of nanoscience and technology--looking both at simulations of nanoscale behavior and at the ways computers have changed the nature of scientific instrumentation central to the pursuit on nanoscale control. She has also addressed societal and policy issues in the Nanotechnology, including an article on US science policy since Reagan, "The End of Pure Science? From Bayh-Dole to the National Nanotechnology Initiative" in a volume titled Discovering the Nanoscale.

Her current research focuses on the role of computers in present-day scientific and engineering practice, looking at the formation and structure of interdisciplinary communities and more broadly, how computers are shaping engineering design, R&D and engineering ethics. In the last year, she has published articles on finite element methods, computer-aided chemical process design and two on computational nanotechnology. She is a co-PI on two NSF grants to study the societal implications of nano and the PI on another NSF grant looking at computing in engineering education.

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