Alan L. Porter is professor emeritus of the School of Public Policy, and of Industrial & Systems Engineering (ISyE). His major concentration is technology forecasting and assessment. He received a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Caltech (1967) and a PhD in Engineering Psychology from UCLA (1972). He served on the University of Washington faculty through 1974, joining Georgia Tech in 1975. He co-directs the Technology Policy and Assessment Center. He is also Director of R&D at Search Technology, Inc.

Dr. Porter has taught workshops on Tech Mining and on Analysis of Emerging Technologies at Georgia Tech, various IBM locations, and in Mexico, South Africa, Botswana, Finland, and China.

He has authored over 200 professional publications. Books include (as author or co-author, editor or co-editor):

1. A Guidebook for Technology Assessment and Impact Analysis, 1980
2. Science, Technology, and National Policy, 1981
3. Interdisciplinary Analysis and Research, 1986
4. Forecasting and Management of Technology, 1991 (2d edition in preparation, 2009).
5. Tech Mining, 2005

Current research focuses on text mining of Science & Technology information resources (research publications, awards, citations, and patents) [see also www.theVantagePoint.com]. This informs Future-oriented Technology Analyses. Current NSF funding includes ongoing work on nanotechnology text data mining to help profile research areas and forecast emerging opportunities. A new NSF project is on "Measuring & Tracking Research Knowledge Integration."

Alan Porter and Fred Rossini co-founded the International Association for Impact Assessment. Alan served it variously as editor of the Impact Assessment Bulletin, Secretary, Executive Director, and President (1995-96).