Biography

William is the Chief Scientist at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, the Associate Director for the Princeton Institute for Computational Science and Engineering, and a Professor in Princeton’s Department of Astrophysical Sciences. He received his Ph.D. in Physics from University of California, Davis, in 1972, having carried out his dissertation research at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, and in 2006 received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Chinese Institute of Engineers-US "for his outstanding leadership in fusion research and contributions to fundamentals of plasma science." He played a prominent leadership role in the development of SciDAC, and is the Director of the Plasma Science Advanced Computing Institute for the DOE's Fusion Energy Sciences Program.