When Gregory Crawford came to Miami July 1, 2016, he left his role as vice president and associate provost at University of Notre Dame, where he led that school’s efforts to develop a presence in California. He was expanding career services, internships, and employment opportunities for Notre Dame undergraduates, recruiting students, enhancing fundraising, and establishing California-based courses and programs.
Crawford joined Notre Dame’s faculty in 2008, serving as the William K. Warren Foundation Dean of Notre Dame’s College of Science. As Warren Dean, he oversaw initiatives including the founding of the department of applied and computational mathematics and statistics, the recruitment of more than 60 faculty and the planning and fundraising for significant new ventures such as the Warren Family Research Center for Drug Discovery and Development.
Crawford previously served as the dean of engineering at Brown University, where he had joined the physics and engineering faculty in 1996.
Holding a bachelor’s (mathematics and physics), master’s (physics), and doctorate (chemical physics) from Kent State University, Crawford completed two postdoctoral fellowships and was a researcher at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center before joining the faculty at Brown. He applies his research background in optics, photonics, and soft matter materials to address areas related to human health, e.g., the analysis and dating of bruises, which are often key pieces of evidence in child abuse cases. He has to his credit more than 400 research and education publications, review articles, and book chapters, and more than 20 U.S. patents and patent applications.
In 2010, Crawford embarked on a cross-country bicycle ride to raise awareness and funds for research on Niemann-Pick Type C Disease, a rare and deadly neurodegenerative disease. He has completed five “Road to Discovery” rides and, with his 2015 route from Long Island, N.Y., to Pebble Beach, Calif., expanded fundraising to include other illnesses being studied at Notre Dame’s Boler-Parseghian Center for Rare and Neglected Diseases. His efforts raised about $2 million dollars for research and clinical trials.
President’s Page at MU
