Doctor Olafson was an instructor at Starfleet Academy who taught the course Transporter Theory. In 2369, Lieutenant Reginald Barclay remembered the day when he realized, as a student in Doctor Olafson's class on Transporter Theory, listening to the doctor speak about the body being converted into billions of kiloquads of data and zipping through subspace, that there was ...no margin for error. One atom out of place and poof! You never come back..." (TNG: "Realm of Fear" ) This character was only mentioned in dialogue. The Starfleet Academy Handbook gives him the first name Brunnel.