Willetta Greene-Johnson
Willetta Greene-Johnson is a senior lecturer in the physics and chemistry departments at Loyola University Chicago. She was one of the first African-American women to complete a Ph.D. degree in theoretical physics. Greene-Johnson is also a Grammy award winning musician for her song "Saved".
Early life and education
Willetta Greene-Johnson was born in Delaware in 1957 and raised in Michigan, surrounded by music and science. Greene's parents were both scientists—her mother, Bettye Washington Greene, was one of the first African-American women to receive a PhD in chemistry and her father, William Miller Greene, was an engineer and former captain in the U.S. Airforce who was trained just a decade after the Tuskegee Airmen. Greene-Johnson's parents exposed her to a wide range of music, including Ella Fitzgerald, Barbra Streisand and The Beatles. One of her earliest memories about her attraction toward orchestral and gospel music started with a performance of Symphony No. 5 (Beethoven).Greene-Johnson's parents encouraged her to pursue a career in science. She began her undergraduate career as a pre-med major but later studied physics at Stanford University, graduating in 1979 with distinction. In 1979 she joined the AT&T Cooperative Research Fellowship Program. As part of the program, she spent a summer working at AT&T's labs. She then pursued her doctoral degree and was one of the first African-American women to complete a PhD in theoretical physics, which she earned in 1988 at the University of Chicago. Her doctoral research focused on the dynamics of vibrational phase relaxation at surfaces.