Dr. Wagner has designed several interdisciplinary courses for Penn State (including those highlighted below). She also frequently serves as supervising faculty for independent studies. Interested students may use this independent studies form.

 

• Biomedical Engineering, Law, & Policy

Description: This seminar course explores ethical, legal, and policy issues relevant to biomedical engineering and precision health. Through directed readings, students will gain an understanding of disruptive innovations in medicine—the technological innovations and the corresponding changes in ethical, legal, and regulatory frameworks that apply to them. Topics to be covered include, e.g., biohacking, citizen science, and civil rights; medical device regulations and consumer protections for mobile health apps, trackers, wearables, implantables, and AI/ML algorithms; governance of human genome editing; bioprinting, equity, transhumanism, and One Health; information privacy and biomedical data governance; biases, discrimination, accountability, and fairness in precision medicine; the learning healthcare system; and more. This course is offered as part of the Law, Policy, and Engineering initiative.

Details: Offered Spring 2022 and Spring 2023; Next anticipated offering is Spring 2026

 

• Engineers and Scientists Shaping Policy

Description: Policy influences and is influenced by science and technology. This course is intended to provide students with knowledge and skills to integrate policy implications into their engineering and scientific research design and to prepare students to be effective agents of change, as engineers and scientists, in both public and private policy. Students will explore policy for science and science for policy, examining position statements and practice guidance issued by the professional organizations and societies relevant to their engineering and scientific discipline. Students will become familiar with theories of policy analysis, with mechanisms that set science policy, and with science policymaking bodies and influencers. Students will learn how to use and communicate technical expertise to help address policy problems on different scales (e.g., local, state, national, and global) and how to integrate ethical, legal, social, and policy components into their own research approach. Assignments will enable students to apply their developing STEM expertise and consider current policy issues through preparation of, for example, ELSI research grant proposals, commentaries, advocacy letters, responses to governmental requests for information, comments on proposed rulemaking, technical assistance on legislation, stakeholder memos, and amici briefs. This course is offered as part of the Law, Policy, and Engineering (LPE) initiative and is ideal for engineers and scientists who seek an understanding of how to engage with the policymaking process and how to advance innovative research with broad societal impacts in mind.

Details: Offered Fall 2022 and Fall 2024; Next anticipated offering is Fall 2025 as LPE 855

 

• Datafied Cultures and Privacy Law

Description: In this course, students will explore contemporary legal, policy, and ethical issues regarding data creation, collection, use, and access in the United States and around the world (such as the European Union). This course will illuminate data justice challenges and examine the diverse ways in which individuals, corporations (including “Big Tech”), and governments approach data and privacy. The course will address privacy harms and how privacy interests are balanced against other competing interests. It will examine existing and emerging privacy torts; applicable constitutional, statutory, and regulatory provisions; institutional policies; and social norms. Students will gain an understanding of the distinct needs and interests of digital minimalists and quantified selves; complex problems of transparency, accountability, and fairness; dataveillance and the human rights it implicates (including rights to privacy, nondiscrimination, science, and health); and data governance frameworks. An emphasis will be placed on health and consumer data and information privacy law. This course is offered as part of the Law, Policy, and Engineering (LPE) initiative and is ideal for advanced undergraduate and graduate students pursuing engineering or scientific careers.

Details: Offered Spring 2023, Fall 2023, and Fall 2024; Next anticipated offering is Spring 2026

 

• Genetics Law

Description: Human genetic and genomic technologies have made considerable advances within the last 20 years, but with those advances have come several challenging legal and ethical issues. This course will take an advanced look at human genetic/omic technologies and the diverse areas of law implicated by their application. This course involves reading recent and emerging scholarly literature and engaging in critical discussions. Topics could include forensics and investigative genetic genealogy; neuro- and behavioral genetics, criminal responsibility, and punishment; consumer protections and personal genomics; immigration and the use of DNA biometrics; precision public health; gene therapies and health law; genome editing, embryo selection, and family law; synthetic genomics and intellectual property; DNA ancestry and minority rights; Indigenous data sovereignty; genetic testing and sports law; genetic discrimination in employment and insurance; genetic privacy and data sharing; and more. While prior coursework in human genetics or law would be helpful, it is not required. 

Details: Offered Fall 2023; Next anticipated offering is TBD

 

• FemTech and Digital Health Privacy

Description: This 1-credit short course will provide an introduction to FemTech and risks and benefits of the dataveillance FemTech enables. This course will focus on an examination of legal and regulatory protections and gaps of digital health privacy laws, with attention to the impact of Dobbs on women’s health privacy and discrimination in digital health technologies. Existing and emerging law in the United States (such as Washington’s My Health, My Data Act) will be explored, and ethical, social, and policy implications of FemTech will be examined.

Details: Offered Spring 2024; Next anticipated offering is TBD

• Introduction to U.S. Biometrics Law

Description: This 1-credit short course will provide an introduction to biometrics and their diverse applications, a history of biometrics, and an overview of the legal and regulatory frameworks that govern biometric systems when used by public agencies and private entities. Existing and emerging law in the United States (such as BIPA) will be explored, and ethical, social, and policy implications of biometrics will be examined.

Details: Offered Spring 2024; Next anticipated offering is TBD

 

• Emerging Law & Ethics for Biomedical AI

Description: This 1-credit short course offers a broad introduction to the dynamic legal, ethical, and policy issues regarding the rapidly expanding use of artificial intelligence (AI) in biomedical settings. Students will consider perspectives, obligations, and protections through the lens of different interested parties (such as patients, consumers, research participants, scientists, clinicians, tech developers, and policymakers). Through directed readings, classroom discussions, lectures, and short assignments, students will explore a wide array of interdisciplinary issues (engaging fields of law, anthropology, data sciences, health sciences, medicine, computational biology, bioethics, and more) and examine the emerging opportunities and challenges for the modern healthcare system in a global, connected world.

Details: Offered Spring 2024; Next anticipated offering is TBD

 

• Boosting Bioethics & Bioprinting

Description: This 1-credit short course will provide an introduction to 3D bioprinting technologies for regenerative medicine and critical consideration of the many ethical, legal, and social issues that correspond to the development and use of these technologies. Topics could include, for example, legal issues related to intellectual property, privacy rights, and personalized bioprinted organs, tissues, and body parts; ethical issues related to resolving physician-patient disagreements about use of natural vs fabricated organs and tissues in clinical care; regulatory gaps at the FDA for 3D bioprinting; and equity in the development and distribution of 3D bioprinted materials. This course is being offered as part of the Law, Policy, and Engineering Initiative and is designed for students across diverse disciplines (including engineering, science, law, ethics, and other programs).

Details: Offered Spring 2025 Session 2 (March 17 – May 2, 2025)