home << newsletters << Fall 2004 index << Nonproliferation Expert Offers Unique Course at UW
 

Newsletter:  Fall 2004/ Issue 6
Nonproliferation Expert Offers Unique Course at UW

by Karyn Durbin

Very few universities in the U.S. offer undergraduate courses that focus specifically on preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The University of Washington is lucky enough to be one of them.

This spring, through the combined efforts of the University of Washington’s Jackson School for International Studies and the Pacific Northwest Center for Global Security, the Institute for Global and Regional Security Studies (IGRSS) offered a new course on WMD detection and proliferation prevention taught by Dr. Jim Fuller, founding Director of the Pacific Northwest Center for Global Security at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Fuller’s impressive resume and his longtime, hands-on contributions to global nonproliferation efforts made him a uniquely qualified instructor.

Fuller designed the course to provide a basic theoretical and practical understanding of WMD development and acquisition, and an overview of proliferation detection technology and its limitations. While the emphasis in the course was on nuclear weapons and nuclear technology, biological and chemical weapons technology and missile delivery system technology were also reviewed.

Fuller is the former Director of the Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation Programs at PNNL. He has served as a leading technical advisor to various governmental and non-governmental agencies involved in WMD proliferation prevention and arms control for almost two decades, both from the venue of the national laboratory as well as on detail in Washington, D.C. Recently retired from PNNL, Fuller continues to consult, focusing on the sensitive issues of cooperative nuclear weapon dismantlement transparency and fissile material control and disposition. He is the author or co-author of numerous unclassified and classified technical briefs and papers on these and other arms control and nonproliferation issues. He is an original co-developer of the nuclear-driven laser, and holds degrees through the doctoral level in engineering physics and the nuclear sciences.

The Institute for Global and Regional Security Studies (IGRSS), founded in 2000, promotes teaching, research, publication, and public outreach on security issues of regional and global concern to the United States. It is one of only a few academic security-related institutes located at a U.S. public university. It combines the scientific resources of PNNL, a U.S. Department of Energy national laboratory, with the scholarly resources of the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. Drawing from multiple disciplines, IGRES provides students an understanding of the interplay between technology and policy in this critical security area. Recent IGRSS graduates have gone on to become U.S. Department of Energy interns and national laboratory employees.