Biography

Brian A. Jackson is a Senior Physical Scientist and currently serves as the Associate Director of RAND's Homeland Security research program. Brian holds a Ph.D. in bioinorganic chemistry from the California Institute of Technology and a Master's degree from George Washington University in Science, Technology, and Public Policy. Dr. Jackson's research focuses on homeland security and terrorism preparedness. Areas of examination have included safety management in large-scale emergency response operations, the equipment and technology needs of emergency responders, and design of preparedness exercises. His terrorism-focused research has examined organizational learning by terrorist groups, terrorist groups' use of technology, development of assessment methods for novel terrorist threats, and examination of the strategies to respond to terrorist targeting of national economies. Key publications include articles in Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, Military Review, and Biosecurity and Bioterrorism on terrorist organizational structures and behavior, intelligence gathering for targeting terrorist and insurgent groups, and analysis of a state-level public health preparedness exercise, as well as the RAND reports Aptitude for Destruction, Volumes 1 & 2, Breaching the Fortress Wall: Understanding Terrorist Efforts to Overcome Defensive Technologies, and Volumes 1 and 3 of the RAND Protecting Emergency Responders series of publications.