| Texas State University • College of Science • Ingram School of Engineering | |
 |
Karl David StephanKarl D. Stephan, Professor Research Interests:
|
Biography | Selected Publications | Links of Interest
Professor Stephan received the B. S. in Engineering from the California Institute of Technology in 1976. Following a year of graduate study at Cornell, he received the Master of Engineering degree in 1977 and was employed by Motorola, Inc. and Scientific-Atlanta as an RF development engineer. He then entered the University of Texas at Austin's graduate program and received the Ph. D. in electrical engineering in 1983. He taught at the University of Massachusetts Amherst from 1983 to 1999, when he received an NSF Science and Technology Studies Fellowship in the history of technology. He spent the 1999-2000 academic year at the University of Texas at Austin, and in 2000 accepted a position as Associate Professor in the Department of Technology at Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas. In 2009, he was promoted to full professor and moved to the Ingram School of Engineering. He has also received an appointment as Adjunct Associate Research Professor at the University of Texas at Austin's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
Prof. Stephan has published over 30 articles in refereed journals, over 40 conference papers, and six articles in books and encyclopedias. He has consulted for MIT's Lincoln Laboratories and industries in the microwave and millimeter-wave fields. He has collaborated with Prof. John R. Pearce of the University of Texas on a research project to investigate the applications of microwave radiometry for temperature sensing in industrial heating.
More recently, he has conducted investigations of naturally occurring luminous spheroids, which include various phenomena such as ball lightning, "earthquake lights," and Marfa lights (named for the West Texas town near which they occur). This research includes both laboratory experiments and field expeditions, and during 2008 was partially funded by a grant from the Julian Schwinger Foundation. He has collaborated in this research with James Bunnell, whose website www.nightorbs.net includes more information on Marfa lights.
More information about luminous spheroids and the Luminous Spheroid Research Laboratory is being developed.
Besides his technical research, Prof. Stephan has published historical articles on radioastronomy, microwaves, and refrigeration. He has published several papers on engineering ethics and served as Treasurer of the IEEE Society on Social Implications of Technology from 2001 to 2007. He is a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and a member of the Society for the History of Technology.
In teaching, he has developed a graduate-level course in microwave metrology and several undergraduate courses, including a senior design project course and junior-level electronics laboratory projects. As Associate Department Head of his department at the University of Massachusetts during 1996-97, he directed a major curriculum revision of both the EE and the CSE programs. At Texas State University, he has taught engineering ethics as part of an ethics and professionalism course for freshmen.
Luminous Spheroids, Ball Lightning, Marfa Lights
Microwave Engineering
Engineering Ethics
History of Technology and Engineering
IEEE Society on Social Implications of Technology
IEEE Virtual Museum, Microwave Section
Society for the History of Technology
A Texan at Harvard: George W. Pierce, Radio Communications Pioneer
(Story provided by Karl D. Stephan)