Mar 01, 2005 - Claremont, Calif. -

"The loss of the space shuttle Columbia has emphasized the importance of safety culture and other social factors in accidents," according to Nancy Leveson, professor of aerospace software engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). "What is needed is a new model of accident causation that integrates the social and the technical factors."

Leveson will explore this new model when she delivers The Dr. Bruce J. Nelson '74 Distinguished Speaker Series lecture on Wednesday, March 9, at 7 p.m., in Galileo Hall at Harvey Mudd College, 301 Platt Blvd. The lecture is free and open to the public. (Note: the lecture will be only on March 9; local calendar listings erred in listing additional dates.)

In her talk, Leveson will describe the new model, based on systems theory, that can be used to create more effective risk assessment, hazard analysis and risk management techniques for complex socio-technical systems using examples from major accidents.

"Traditional safety engineering techniques are based on an underlying model of accident causation," Leveson said, "that views accidents as the result of chains of directly linked failure events. This model dates back to Hume and the engineering techniques were created for mechanical systems and extended to electro-mechanical systems. Unfortunately, they are not very effective in the complex, software-intensive systems being built today, and they ignore all the social and organizational factors in accidents."

Leveson is professor of aerospace software engineering and professor of engineering systems in the MIT Aeronautics and Astronautics Department. She conducts research on the topics of system safety, software safety, software and system engineering and human-computer interaction. She is an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). In 1999, she received the ACM Allen Newell Award for outstanding computer science research and in 1995 the AIAA Information Systems Award for "developing the field of software safety and for promoting responsible software and system engineering practices where life and property are at stake." This year she received the ACM Sigsoft Outstanding Research Award.

Leveson's lecture is part of The Dr. Bruce J. Nelson '74 Distinguished Speaker Series, which was created by Nelson's family to honor the memory of the late HMC alumnus. For more information about Bruce J. Nelson and the series, visit the Web site at: www.hmc.edu/speaker/.