Ben Johnson, Ed.D., has been a university faculty member/administrator for more than 36 years. Over his career, Dr. Johnson has previously worked at Georgia State University, Kennesaw State University, City University of New York (CUNY) Brooklyn College, and the University of Kentucky. 

He is the author of numerous sports medicine-related research articles and is a frequent presenter at international and national professional meetings. He was a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Medical Commission from 1990-1999 and coordinated the IOC’s Sport Science Research Projects during the 1996 Atlanta Centennial Olympic Summer Games. Dr. Johnson also served on a number of international sport-related committees including the Program Committee for the 1996 IOC World Congress on Sport Science.

Dr. Johnson has been the co-primary investigator on eight Department of State International Sport Programming Initiative projects since 2002 and several other federally funded projects. He is the co-founder of the African Academy of Disability Sport and Founder of the International Academy for Disability Rights. Dr. Johnson is the recipient of more than $11 million in funding throughout his career.

For nearly 30 years, Dr. Johnson was an expert witness and consultant on work-related musculoskeletal injury legal cases. He specializes in the biomechanical aspects of occupational tasks to identify acute and chronic movement and environmental factors that may contribute to musculoskeletal injury.

Areas of Expertise

He has extensive and varied expertise in the Colleges of Health Sciences and Practice and Institute of Public Health, Health and Human Service, Health and Human Sciences, Natural and Behavioral Sciences, and Education. 

work-related musculoskeletal injury legal cases

Education

• Ed.D., Kinesiology, University of Kentucky
• M.A., Education and Physical Education Administration, East Carolina University
• B.A., Physical Education, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• B.A., Recreation Administration, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Research

• sports medicine-related research
• work-related musculoskeletal injury
• biomechanical aspects of occupational tasks
• environmental factors that may contribute to musculoskeletal injury

Publications

• Martinez GJ, Ma X, Best S, et. al. "Implementation of High Intensity Interval Training and Autoregulatory Progressive Resistance Exercise in a Law Enforcement Training Academy." International journal of exercise science, 15(4), (2022) 1246-1261.
• Veyer DL, Maluquer de Motes C, Sumner RP, et. al. "Analysis of the anti-apoptotic activity of four vaccinia virus proteins demonstrates that B13 is the most potent inhibitor in isolation and during viral infection." The Journal of general virology, 95(Pt 12), (2014) 2757-2768. doi: 10.1099/vir.0.068833-0
• Saraiva N, Prole DL, Carrara G, et. al. "hGAAP promotes cell adhesion and migration via the stimulation of store-operated Ca2+ entry and calpain 2." The Journal of cell biology, 202(4), (2013) 699-713. doi: 10.1083/jcb.201301016
• Saraiva N, Prole DL, Carrara G, et. al. "Human and viral Golgi anti-apoptotic proteins (GAAPs) oligomerize via different mechanisms and monomeric GAAP inhibits apoptosis and modulates calcium." The Journal of biological chemistry, 288(18), (2013) 13057-67. doi: 10.1074/jbc.M112.414367
• Hui EP, Taylor GS, Jia H, et. al. "Phase I trial of recombinant modified vaccinia ankara encoding Epstein-Barr viral tumor antigens in nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients." Cancer research, 73(6), (2013) 1676-88. doi: 10.1158/0008-5472.CAN-12-2448
• Carrara G, Saraiva N, Gubser C, et. al. "Six-transmembrane topology for Golgi anti-apoptotic protein (GAAP) and Bax inhibitor 1 (BI-1) provides model for the transmembrane Bax inhibitor-containing motif (TMBIM) family." The Journal of biological chemistry, 287(19), (2012) 15896-905. doi: 10.1074/jbc.M111.336149
• Galiano M, Johnson BF, Myers R, et. al. "Fatal cases of influenza A(H3N2) in children: insights from whole genome sequence analysis." PloS one, 7(3), (2012) e33166. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0033166

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