MechSE associate professor Amy Wagoner Johnson has received the Excellence in Guiding Undergraduate Research Award, a campus-level award, for her efforts and accomplishments in guiding undergraduate students in research endeavors.
Written by Meredith Staub
MechSE associate professor Amy Wagoner Johnson has received the Excellence in Guiding Undergraduate Research Award, a campus-level award, for her efforts and accomplishments in guiding undergraduate students in research endeavors.
The Excellence in Guiding Undergraduate Research Award is given to a faculty member at the recommendation of their peers. The faculty member should have sustained excellence in involving and guiding undergraduate students in research projects, a positive impact on student scholarship or intellectual development, and innovative approaches to guiding undergraduate research.
Professor Wagoner Johnson received her B.S. in Materials Science and Engineering from Ohio State University and her M.S. and Ph.D. from Brown University in Materials Science. She is a member of the ASME Bioengineering Division Tissue and Cellular Engineering Committee, the Society of Engineering Science, and the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS). She received the Engineering Council Award for Excellence in Advising in 2012 and the Amy L Devine Recognition Award from Alpha Omega Epsilon for “being a passionate engineering professor and outstanding advisor” in 2009.
Wagoner Johnson’s research is in biomechanics. She and her research team work in biomaterials, with the goal of designing a synthetic bone substitute material that may eventually replace bone grafts. In order to make this substitute material—a scaffold made from hydroxyapatite—efficient and mechanically sound, they are first increasing understanding of how certain factors affect bone growth, how the cells and tissues interact with or modify their environment, and how drug or stem cell delivery may be able to improve bone in-growth.