Dean
Pratt School of Engineering, Duke University
(profile at the time of induction in 2003)
Dr. Kristina M. Johnson is a leading light in the field of optoelectronics, an area which has become the basis for a mammoth communications and computing industry and spawned inventions ranging from worldwide networks of high-capacity optical fiber to laser-based disk recorders and players for computer data, music and movies. She is currently serving as the Dean of the Edmund T. Pratt, Jr. School of Engineering at Duke University.
Before joining Duke University, Dr. Johnson was a professor of electrical engineering at the University of Colorado, Boulder, where she was leader in interdisciplinary research melding light with electronics. Her research and teaching include holography (the creation of three-dimensional images with light wave interference patterns), optical and signal processing, liquid crystal electro-optics, and using a novel variety of liquid crystals to create new types of miniature displays and computer monitors.
Dr. Johnson holds 44 patents and over 140 refereed journal publications. In 1991, she won a regional Emmy nomination for a 10-part television series, "Physics of Light", directed toward middle-school students and shown throughout the Rocky Mountain Region.
In 1994, Dr. Johnson helped found the Colorado Advanced Technology Institute Center for Excellence in Optoelectronics. She has also co-founded two companies, ColorLink, Inc. and KAJ, LLC. ColorLink makes components of color projection devices based upon differing polarizations or vibrational states of light. KAJ, LLC is an intellectual property licensing company that assists new firms using technology pioneered at the Optoelectronics Computing Systems Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
Dr. Johnson is a Fellow of the Optical Society of America and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). She won the 1993 International Denis Gabor Medal for Outstanding Achievement in Modern Optics. In 1994, she received the Photronics Spectra Circle of Excellence award for her invention of a new form of liquid crystal display.
Dr. Johnson holds B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University. She joined the University of Colorado at Boulder faculty in 1985 after research work at IBM and at Trinity College in Ireland. She also excelled in sports, playing varsity hockey and lacrosse at Stanford and competing at the international level in cricket while in Ireland.
