Physicist and physics professor David Garrison was born on October 27, 1975 in Chicago, Illinois, though he
spent his childhood in O’Fallon, Missouri. He graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in
1997 with his B.S. degree in physics. In 2002, he obtained his Ph.D. degree in physics from Pennsylvania
State University. That same year, he began working at the University of Houston-Clear Lake (UHCL) as an
assistant professor and later became an associate professor and faculty chair of the department. He set up
the physics department and created the curriculum for undergraduate and graduate programs in addition to
teaching and research responsibilities. His research fields include computational physics and cosmology and
have led him to collaborative projects with NASA’s Johnson Space Center, including one for a plasma rocket
engine. Garrison has also been involved in university governance, having sat on the UHCL University
Council, Academic Council, and Faculty Senate.