Ron Pachence, PhD, joined the faculty in 1981. He has served as department chair, founding director of the Institute for Christian Ministries, and director of graduate programs in the department. He is active in shared governance, having served on numerous committees and as chair of the University Senate. His teaching expertise is in the areas of Catholic theology and world religions. Pachence is a returned Peace Corps Volunteer (Turkey) and a Catholic priest of the Diocese of Savannah, Georgia.

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Dr. Anderson is the newest Assistant Professor of Physics at USD.  She begins her appointment in the fall of 2009. Her undergraduate work was done at Georgetown University, where she graduated Magna Cum Laude in Physics in 2003, and she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She is held in high regard by students and faculty at UCSD for her teaching of UCSD’s Physics 1A introductory physics course, which she taught while doing post-doctoral studies at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, CA. Her doctoral research at UCSD focused experimentally on the biophysics of DNA, using both microscopy and laser techniques.  Her post-doctoral studies were also devoted to single molecule biophysics, focusing on the molecule Rev, a regulatory protein of importance in HIV-1 studies.

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Harriet Baber, PhD, has been a member of the faculty since 1982. She offers undergraduate courses on logic and contemporary analytic philosophy. Her research interests are in analytic metaphysics, philosophical theology, feminism and philosophy of economics. Baber’s interests include computers, Byzantine history, and knitting.

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Mary Sue Lowery, PhD, joined the biology faculty in 1990.  She teaches preparatory courses for biology majors, as well as biological oceanography and interdisciplinary team-taught honors courses.  Lowery is a comparative biologist with particular interest in the effect of endurance swimming on the development of muscle in juvenile marine fishes.

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Eric Pierson, PhD, joined the faculty in 1999. Prior to joining the faculty he spent five years teaching at the University of Illinois st Urbana-Champaign while pursuing his PhD He served as chair of the department between Fall 2006 and Spring 2011.

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Emily Reimer-Barry, Ph.D, has been a member of the Theology and Religious Studies faculty since 2008. She teaches undergraduate courses in Catholic theology, Christian ethics, sexual ethics, and ethical responses to HIV/AIDS. Her research interests include women’s experiences of HIV/AIDS, cross-cultural analysis of gender roles and marriage traditions, ethnography and ethical methodology, and the intersection of public health and Catholic social teachings.

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After completing a thesis in experimental plasma physics in the area of fusion energy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he was appointed Assistant Professor of Physics at USD in 1987, becoming a full professor in 1994. He currently serves as Chair of the Department of Physics. His teaching ranges from Physics and Society to Quantum Physics, and he created the first advanced upper division laboratory course, Experimental Modern Physics, in the physics curriculum. His research focuses on experimental basic plasma physics and the use of tunable lasers as a diagnostic for ion dynamics.

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Professor Taylor has been a member of the USD faculty since 1990. She teaches courses in introductory psychology, research methods and cognitive psychology. Her research interests currently focus on teaching-related issues, including student engagement and conceptual change of misconceptions. She received her PhD in general experimental psychology in 1987 from the University of Southern California. Her specialty area was information processing cognitive psychology. She later completed a three-year postdoctoral training program at the Andrus Gerontology Center in Los Angeles, where she studied cognitive aging, specifically focusing on attention and memory.

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