Dr. Gary E. Johnson was named Interim Vice President for Research at the University of North Dakota in February 2007. He concurrently serves as Associate Vice President for Research and Co-Project Director for the National Science Foundation sponsored North Dakota Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (ND EPSCoR). He also holds faculty appointments as Professor of Earth System Science and Policy in the John D. Odegard School of Aerospace Sciences and as Adjunct Professor of Geography. He holds an Associates degree from Bismarck State College, Bachelor and Master's degrees in Geography from UND, and a Ph.D. from Indiana State University.

He began his academic career with the Department of Geography at UND in 1966, culminating as Associate Professor and Chair of the Department in 1976. He subsequently spent two years with the administration of ND Governor Art Link implementing and managing the West Central North Dakota Regional Environmental Impact Study on proposed lignite coal development in a seven-county area of western ND. He returned to UND from the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 2002 where he managed the Science and Applications Division of Lockheed Martin's Remote Sensing Directorate in support of NASA's Earth Science Enterprise at Stennis Space Center. Upon his initial return, Johnson served as Research Professor and Executive Officer of the Upper Midwest Aerospace Consortium (UMAC). He assumed his position in the Division of Research in August of 2005.

Johnson's intervening career has spanned industry, government and academia. His international work has included two years as an Associate Professor at the Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok, Thailand where he was responsible for the implementation of the Asian Regional Remote Sensing Training Center. He subsequently managed the United Nations Environment Programme's (UNEP) Global Resource Information Database (GRID) in Bangkok for an additional two years. He worked for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as a Principal Remote Sensing Scientist and Branch Chief in support of NOAA's drought early warning research and training activities in the Sahel of Africa and in SE Asia while based in Columbia, MO.

Johnson worked for the not-for-profit Consortium for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) as Vice President and Manager of the Information Resources and Technologies Division. He has also held research and management positions with aerospace contractors Hughes and Lockheed Martin in support of the US Geological Survey and NASA respectively. He has held Adjunct Professor positions in Geography and Remote Sensing with South Dakota State University and the University of Missouri.