{"id":597,"date":"2018-10-12T11:39:00","date_gmt":"2018-10-12T15:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/?p=597"},"modified":"2025-07-08T12:17:50","modified_gmt":"2025-07-08T16:17:50","slug":"living-in-the-glass-age","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/news\/living-in-the-glass-age\/","title":{"rendered":"Living in the Glass Age"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>When Jackie Johnson started researching glass 25 years ago, she didn\u2019t realize she was on the so-called cutting edge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhat we\u2019re doing is finally in fashion,\u201d laughed the professor of mechanical, aerospace, and biomedical engineering at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.utsi.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">University of Tennessee Space Institute<\/a> (UTSI).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s because, according to some scientists, we are in the \u201cGlass Age.\u201d Think of it; almost everything we use today has glass\u2014from touchscreens on our smartphones, to computers, buildings, automobiles, and thousands of other applications around the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignright size-medium\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"225\" height=\"300\" src=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2025\/07\/Jackie-Johnson-in-a-lab-225x300.jpg\" alt=\"Jackie Johnson working on a project in a lab\" class=\"wp-image-601\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2025\/07\/Jackie-Johnson-in-a-lab-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2025\/07\/Jackie-Johnson-in-a-lab.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 225px) 100vw, 225px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>What makes glass so prevalent is its versatility. It can be made in almost any shape or size. It has a wide range of useful properties\u2014and therefore a wide range of applications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWith glass, you can add a component to it and get totally different properties,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cBut it isn\u2019t easy to do. Glass is an amorphous material with a short-range order so it\u2019s hard to pin down a definitive structure of the material.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The challenge is what\u2019s attracted Johnson to glass. She loves that it makes her think and holds promise for Johnson to make a big impact in people\u2019s lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Among many areas, Johnson is studying glass to improve medical imaging. By mixing certain compounds she can produce a glass-ceramic image plate. Unlike other imaging materials, glass is transparent. It doesn\u2019t scatter light, which keeps images sharp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sharper images mean earlier detection of diseases like cancer. It can also mean less costly health care.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIn a large hospital setting, with digital radiography technology, many expensive detector systems are needed for x-ray readout. With our technology, based on computed radiography (CR), the images are projected onto the glass plates, which store the images. Then you only need one central system to read the image plates,\u201d Johnson explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Similar CR technology is used in many parts of the world, including the US, but the images aren\u2019t as sharp as Johnson\u2019s work, which won an R&amp;D100 award in 2007.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Other projects Johnson is involved with include development of sodium ion batteries, diamond-like carbon films for biomedical applications, and treatment for cancerous tumors using magnetic fields.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Despite being in a so-called Glass Age, the number of rising glass scientists is low. This is something Johnson is trying to change. She started an internship program at UTSI where several students ended up becoming graduate students at the institute, working on glass-related projects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She also has funding from the <a href=\"https:\/\/foundation.ceramics.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Ceramic and Glass Industry Foundation<\/a> to put on a twice-yearly lecture series hosted by her graduate students to educate local high school students on the merits of working in glass and ceramics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThere are a surprisingly large number of glass industries in Tennessee across several disciplines such as automobile manufacturing. In fact, Tennessee ranks number one in the country for automotive manufacturing strength,\u201d Johnson shared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are operations for Nissan, General Motors, and Volkswagen, to name a few, as well as multiple window glass companies and bottling companies, such as Coca Cola, and a large battery complex for Nissan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe region is primed for glass development and manufacturing so there is a need to educate our youth on the potential for great research careers,\u201d explained Johnson, who is keen for others to be in fashion, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"width:100%\"><div style=\"width: 15%;height: 10px;margin: 40px 0 px;border-bottom: 6px solid #ff8200\"><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Contact<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Whitney Heins<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jacqueline Johnson is studying glass to improve medical imaging, possibly leading to earlier detection of cancer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[150,149,21],"class_list":["post-597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-ceramic-and-glass-industry-foundation","tag-jackie-johnson","tag-utsi"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Living in the Glass Age<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Jacqueline Johnson is studying glass to improve medical imaging, possibly leading to earlier detection of cancer.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tickle.utk.edu\/mae\/news\/living-in-the-glass-age\/\" \/>\n<meta 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