Dr. Lynne A. Molter

Dr. Lynne A. Molter is a Professor of Engineering at Swarthmore College.

Her research in optics and photonics has focused on waveguide and fiber optic devices for signal processing and sensing applications. Over 100 undergraduate students have been research assistants in her on-campus laboratory. She is also very committed to increasing student retention in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines, with special attention to women and members of under-represented minority groups.

Molter’s work in photonics has been supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) along with small grants and donations from businesses; she has been funded by The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the NSF (through collaboration with the Business and Higher Education Forum) to study and increase participation in STEM. She was the PI of a 35-institution Sloan-funded effort to develop predictive models for student retention that included ~20 historically black colleges and universities.

She is a member of the IEEE, OSA, ASEE, AAUP, and WEPAN, and has been a reviewer/panel member for organizations including the NSF, IEEE, OSA, SPIE, and the DoD and member services.

Molter is a former chair of the Department of Engineering and Division of Natural Sciences at Swarthmore College. She earned her Sc.D. and S.M. in EECS from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and her B.S. in Engineering and B.A. in Mathematics from Swarthmore College.