A Modern History of Materials (PDF)

M. Grant Norton is Dean of the Honors College and Professor in the School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering at Washington State University. He obtained his Ph.D. in Materials from Imperial College and spent a two-year postdoctoral at Cornell University before joining the Washington State University faculty in 1991. In 2003 and 2004, he was Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) Faculty Research Associate at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio and spent the 1999/2000 academic year as Visiting Professor at Oxford University. From 2004 to 2007, he held Herman and Brita Lindholm Endowed Chair. In 2017, he was a participant in the German-American Fulbright Commission Seminar for U.S. Administrators in International Education. He has held Visiting Professor positions in the Chien-Shiung Wu Honors College at Southeast University in Nanjing and as Global Faculty Fellow at Tecnológico de Monterrey.






Professor Norton's research is primarily focused on applications of nanomaterials in clean energy and the life sciences. He is author or co-author of over 200 papers in the archival literature, several book chapters and patents, two textbooks including Ceramic Materials: Science and Engineering, and most recently the popular science book Ten Materials that Shaped our World. He serves as Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Materials Science and on the International Editorial Board of Journal of Materials Education.

Prior to entering academia, he worked for two major European multinationals: Cookson Group PLC and Heraeus GmbH. He has consulted for a number of companies and organizations including the United States Air Force and REC Silicon, the world's largest producer of silicon materials. From 2009 to 2011, he was on the Board of Directors of the Washington Technology Center (a gubernatorial appointment). He currently serves on several boards including the advisory board for the Thomas S. Foley Institute for PublicPolicy