Steven Cowley

Last updated

Professor
Sir Steve Cowley
FRS FREng FInstP
Professor Steven Cowley FRS.jpg
Cowley in 2014
7thDirector of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
Incumbent
Assumed office
1 July 2018
Known for Fusion power
Awards Knight Bachelor (2018)
Glazebrook Medal (2012) [2]
Harkness Fellowship (1981–83)
Fields
Institutions
Thesis Some Aspects of Anomalous Transport in Tokamaks: Stochastic Magnetic Fields, Tearing Modes and Nonlinear Ballooning Instabilities (Convection)  (1985)
Doctoral advisor Russell Kulsrud [4]

Sir Steven Charles Cowley (born 1959)[ citation needed ] is a British theoretical physicist and international authority on nuclear fusion and astrophysical plasmas. He has served as director of the United States Department of Energy (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) since 1 July 2018. [5] Cowley is also a member of the Commission on the Scaling of Fusion Energy [6] , a 12-month effort to create a shared vision for government, academia, and industry on fusion. [7] In May 2024, he was appointed the chair of the Board of Trustees for the Faraday Institution. [8] Previously he served as president of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, since October 2016. [9] He was also the head of the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM) / Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE) and chief executive officer of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA). [9]

Contents

Education

Cowley won a scholarship to Corpus Christi College, Oxford and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Physics in 1981. [9] He went on to study at Princeton University as a Harkness Fellow and was awarded a PhD in 1985 for research into tokamaks supervised by Russell Kulsrud. [4] [10] [11] [12]

Career and research

Following his PhD, Cowley completed postdoctoral research at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE). He returned to Princeton in 1987 and joined the faculty at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1993, becoming full professor in 2000. At Imperial College, London, Cowley led the plasma physics group from 2001 to 2003, while also serving as a part-time professor. [13] [14] He was appointed as the head of the EURATOM / CCFE Fusion Association in September 2008 and as CEO of UKAEA in November 2009.

On 18 March 2015, he was elected the 31st President of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, his alma mater: he took up the post on 1 October 2016. He is the first scientist to hold the post. [15]

On 1 July 2018, he was appointed director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL). [16]

Cowley's research interests are in plasmas and nuclear fusion, in astrophysical plasmas and the laboratory, such as the Joint European Torus (JET) and the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). [3] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] His research has been funded by Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). [25] [26] Cowley co-chaired the National Academy of Sciences assessment of plasma science in the United States. [27] [28] [29]

Inspiring Growth at PPPL

Cowley has been central to PPPL’s new and expanded mission into research areas beyond traditional fusion work. This effort is culminating in the construction of a new building at PPPL: the Princeton Plasma Innovation Center (PPIC). PPIC is designed to support PPPL’s expanded mission into microelectronics, quantum sensors and devices, and sustainability sciences while housing theoretical and computational scientists. Cowley spoke of PPPL’s quest to diversify the Lab at the May 2024 PPIC groundbreaking. “The Lab had one mission until now, and that was delivering fusion energy,” Cowley said. “Now, that mission has broadened really because we need to serve the nation, and we have the skills to do that.” [30] [31]

At the same time, Cowley has continued to express the Lab’s strong commitment to basic science research, including astrophysics. At the unveiling of the Facility for Laboratory Reconnection Experiments (FLARE) in June 2025, Cowley said the experiment — which is designed to study magnetic reconnection —  represents the next generation of research into fundamental plasma physics and will serve as a collaborative research platform for scientists worldwide. [32] [33]

“We have fulfilled our promise to design and build this one-of-a-kind device and offer it to the scientific community. I expect FLARE to produce important insights for plasma science in the coming years, and I just can't wait.” [32]

Computational approaches and future vision

Cowley supports integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into fusion system design. He told an audience at his University of Oxford Lamb Lecture that integrated modeling systems “with multiscale simulations, plus AI surrogates, plus simulations of the neutrons, simulations of the damage, and simulations of the engineering to try to design a better fusion system” [34] are needed to design the ideal fusion system. “We’ve got to stop guessing how to get to fusion and start calculating how to get to fusion.” [35]

In his 2025 Robert Hofstadter Memorial Lecture at Stanford University, Cowley noted StellFoundry as one such project at PPPL that is using AI to try to find the ideal configuration for stellarators.

“Artificial intelligence may help us a lot. We find that we can replace a lot of steps in post now with steps in codes now with steps in artificial intelligence. This shortens the time to calculate the configurations and will allow us to survey all different configurations and come up with an optimal solution out of that.” [36]

In an opinion piece in The Washington Post, however, Cowley pointed out that “a digital solution is not enough,” calling for “investments in the tens of billions of dollars” to build a fusion pilot plant. He also noted that developing a highly skilled workforce and international collaboration are key. “I am now firmly convinced it isn’t if, but when fusion will be deployed at scale. Undoubtedly, by the end of this century, clean, safe, sustainable fusion reactors will power cities, towns, data centers, and factories. … I won’t live to see it happen, but I take comfort in knowing that babies born today might well witness the world transformed. [37]

Awards and honours

Cowley was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2014. His biography reads:

Steven Cowley is a leading plasma theorist and currently chief executive officer at the UK Atomic Energy Authority. Much of his research career has been devoted to modelling and understanding plasma turbulence in nuclear fusion, a phenomenon that must be controlled to achieve stable fusion.

Nuclear fusion will offer future generations a cleaner and safer source of energy and has the potential to meet the majority of the world's energy demands. At present, however, more energy is required to feed the process than can be produced. Steven is leading the UK's participation in ITER, an experimental reactor that is set to make nuclear fusion commercially viable.

Steven's interest in plasmas extends to those found on a large scale throughout the Universe. He showed that these astrophysical plasmas also invariably exhibit turbulence, which amplifies and shapes their magnetic fields. Steven presented a 2009 TED talk entitled Fusion is Energy's Future and received the 2012 Glazebrook Medal from the Institute of Physics, which rewards leadership in a physics context. [38]

His certificate of election reads:

Professor Cowley is currently chief executive officer at the UK Atomic Energy Authority and Professor at Imperial College. Over the last twenty years he has played a leading role in developing the multi-scale approach to computing the plasma turbulence in fusion experiments. Now such computations routinely reproduce experimental results. Multi-scale computational tools will be central to the successful development of fusion power. He discovered a key mechanism for the observed explosive eruptions from confined plasmas. Using analysis and computations Cowley and collaborators have shown that astrophysical plasmas are invariably turbulent. They have described the multi-scale spectra and structure of this turbulence and how it amplifies and shapes the magnetic field in the large scale plasmas of the universe. [39]

Cowley was also elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) in 1998, [40] the Institute of Physics (FInstP) in 2004 [41] and the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng) in 2014. [42] He was awarded an honorary fellowship of the Institute of Engineering and Technology in 2015. In 2011, he was appointed to the UK Government's Council for Science and Technology. [43]

In the 2018 Birthday Honours, Cowley was appointed a Knight Bachelor for services to science and to the development of nuclear fusion. [44] In July 2019, Cowley was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Science (honoris causa) by the University of Lancaster for his standing as the international authority on fusion energy. [45]

Family

Steven Cowley is the grandson of John Duncan Cowley, who was the director of the School of Librarianship of the University of London. He is also the great-great-nephew of Sir Arthur Ernest Cowley.

Cowley met his future wife, Margaret Koval, during his graduate studies at Princeton University when she arrived as a new graduate student. [46] Koval worked as an Emmy-award-winning television writer, producer, and director for ABC and PBS. [47] [48] She is now a painter. [49] They married in 1985, shortly before Cowley defended his doctoral thesis. The couple has two sons: Brendan and Sean. [46]

References

  1. ↑ England & Wales, Civil Registration Birth Index, 1916-2007
  2. ↑ "Professor Steven Cowley FREng FRS". raeng.org.uk. Archived from the original on 20 December 2014.
  3. 1 2 Steven Cowley publications indexed by Google Scholar OOjs UI icon edit-ltr-progressive.svg
  4. 1 2 Steven Cowley at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
  5. ↑ "Steven Cowley named director of DOE's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory". Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. 16 May 2018. Archived from the original on 28 September 2021. Retrieved 16 June 2018.
  6. ↑ "Meet the Commissioners". The Commission on the Scaling of Fusion Energy. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  7. ↑ "About". The Commission on the Scaling of Fusion Energy. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  8. ↑ "Sir Steven Cowley". The Faraday Institute. Retrieved 19 September 2025.
  9. 1 2 3 "Cowley, Prof. Steven" . Who's Who (online Oxford University Press  ed.). Oxford: A & C Black. 2016. doi:10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.U261946.(Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  10. ↑ Cowley, Steven Charles (1985). Some Aspects of Anomalous Transport in Tokamaks: Stochastic Magnetic Fields, Tearing Modes and Nonlinear Ballooning Instabilities (Convection) (PhD thesis). Princeton University. OCLC   77633911. ProQuest   303381032.
  11. ↑ "Professor Steve Cowley". Culham Centre for Fusion Energy. Archived from the original on 16 April 2015.
  12. ↑ Steven Cowley at TED
  13. ↑ "Chief Executive Officer, Professor Steven Cowley". gov.uk. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016.
  14. ↑ Davies, Sean (16 May 2011). "Q and A – Steve Cowley – Culham Centre for Fusion Energy". E&T: Engineering and Technology Magazine. 6 (5). The Institution of Engineering and Technology. Archived from the original on 14 July 2014.
  15. ↑ "Corpus announces the election of its next President". Oxford: Corpus Christi College. Archived from the original on 21 April 2015.
  16. ↑ "Steven Cowley named director of DOE's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory". 16 May 2018. Archived from the original on 16 May 2018.
  17. ↑ Steven Cowley publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
  18. ↑ Ham, C J; Connor, J W; Cowley, S C; Hastie, R J; Hender, T C; Liu, Y Q (2013). "The role of pressure flattening in calculating tearing mode stability". Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion. 55 (12) 125015. arXiv: 1308.2070 . Bibcode:2013PPCF...55l5015H. doi:10.1088/0741-3335/55/12/125015. ISSN   0741-3335. S2CID   119516411.
  19. ↑ Schekochihin, A. A.; Cowley, S. C.; Dorland, W.; Hammett, G. W.; Howes, G. G.; Quataert, E.; Tatsuno, T. (2009). "Astrophysical Gyrokinetics: Kinetic and Fluid Turbulent Cascades in Magnetized Weakly Collisional Plasmas". The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. 182 (1): 310–377. arXiv: 0704.0044 . Bibcode:2009ApJS..182..310S. doi:10.1088/0067-0049/182/1/310. ISSN   0067-0049. S2CID   119630468.
  20. ↑ Schekochihin, Alexander A.; Cowley, Steven C.; Taylor, Samuel F.; Maron, Jason L.; McWilliams, James C. (2004). "Simulations of the Small-Scale Turbulent Dynamo". The Astrophysical Journal. 612 (1): 276–307. arXiv: astro-ph/0312046 . Bibcode:2004ApJ...612..276S. doi:10.1086/422547. ISSN   0004-637X. S2CID   119444289.
  21. ↑ Cole, M D J; Newton, S L; Cowley, S C; Loureiro, N F; Dickinson, D; Roach, C; Connor, J W (2014). "Electromagnetic effects in the stabilization of turbulence by sheared flow". Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion. 56 (1) 015007. arXiv: 1308.0989 . Bibcode:2014PPCF...56a5007C. doi:10.1088/0741-3335/56/1/015007. ISSN   0741-3335. S2CID   118432893.
  22. ↑ Hammett, G W; Beer, M A; Dorland, W; Cowley, S C; Smith, S A (1993). "Developments in the gyrofluid approach to Tokamak turbulence simulations" (PDF). Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion. 35 (8): 973–985. Bibcode:1993PPCF...35..973H. doi:10.1088/0741-3335/35/8/006. ISSN   0741-3335. S2CID   250771660.
  23. ↑ Howes, Gregory G.; Cowley, Steven C.; Dorland, William; Hammett, Gregory W.; Quataert, Eliot; Schekochihin, Alexander A. (2006). "Astrophysical Gyrokinetics: Basic Equations and Linear Theory". The Astrophysical Journal. 651 (1): 590–614. arXiv: astro-ph/0511812 . Bibcode:2006ApJ...651..590H. doi:10.1086/506172. ISSN   0004-637X. S2CID   15344422.
  24. ↑ Beer, M. A.; Cowley, S. C.; Hammett, G. W. (1995). "Field-aligned coordinates for nonlinear simulations of tokamak turbulence". Physics of Plasmas. 2 (7): 2687. Bibcode:1995PhPl....2.2687B. CiteSeerX   10.1.1.22.4582 . doi:10.1063/1.871232. ISSN   1070-664X.
  25. ↑ "Grants awarded to Steven Cowley, EURATOM/CCFE". Swindon: Research Councils UK. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016.
  26. ↑ "Grants awarded to Steven Cowley, Imperial College London". Swindon: Research Councils UK. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016.
  27. ↑ Plasma Science: Advancing Knowledge in the National Interest (National Academy Press 2007) ISBN   0309109396
  28. ↑ Steven Cowley: Fusion is energy's future, TED talk on YouTube, 2009-12-22
  29. ↑ Fusion energy with Professor Steven Cowley, Institute of Physics on YouTube
  30. ↑ Jackson DeVoe, Jeanne (13 May 2024). "PPPL looks to the future as it breaks ground on the Princeton Plasma Innovation Center". Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  31. ↑ Harrison, Andrew (16 May 2024). "This is magic". Central Jersey. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  32. 1 2 Fazelpoor, Matthew (16 June 2025). "PPPL launches FLARE for next-gen plasma research". NJ Biz. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  33. ↑ Rosen, Raphael (12 June 2025). "Unprecedented new device at PPPL will help to unravel the mysteries of the universe". Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  34. ↑ Department of Physics University of Oxford (13 June 2025). Lamb Lecture 2025 - 'Fusion energy: why, how and when' by Professor Steve Cowley . Retrieved 29 September 2025– via YouTube.
  35. ↑ Department of Physics University of Oxford (13 June 2025). Lamb Lecture 2025 - 'Fusion energy: why, how and when' by Professor Steve Cowley . Retrieved 29 September 2025– via YouTube.
  36. ↑ Stanford Physics (21 May 2025). Steven Cowley- "Fusion Energy: Why, How and When" . Retrieved 29 September 2025– via YouTube.
  37. ↑ "Opinion | The world-saving potential of nuclear fusion just got a huge boost". The Washington Post. 20 August 2024. ISSN   0190-8286 . Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  38. ↑ Anon (2014). "Professor Steven Cowley FREng FRS". Archived from the original on 6 March 2016. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:
    "All text published under the heading 'Biography' on Fellow profile pages is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License." -- "Royal Society Terms, conditions and policies". Archived from the original on 25 September 2015. Retrieved 9 March 2016.
  39. ↑ "Professor Steven Cowley FRS, Chief Executive Officer, UK Atomic Energy Authority". London: The Royal Society. Archived from the original on 5 August 2014.
  40. ↑ "List of Fellows of the American Physical Society" . Retrieved 23 April 2021.
  41. ↑ "Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory profile" . Retrieved 23 April 2021.
  42. ↑ "List of Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering" . Retrieved 23 April 2021.
  43. ↑ "UKAEA Steven Cowley to advise UK government". ITER. July 2011. Retrieved 23 October 2020.
  44. ↑ "No. 62310". The London Gazette (Supplement). 9 June 2018. p. B2.
  45. ↑ "Honorary degree for Professor Sir Steven Cowley". www.lancaster.ac.uk. Lancaster University. Retrieved 18 July 2019.
  46. 1 2 "Steve Cowley: The knight who leads the Lab has "the most fun job"". www.pppl.gov. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  47. ↑ "Margaret Koval | Producer, Director, Writer". IMDb. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  48. ↑ "Art News Now | Independent Arts News Reporting". Art News Now. Retrieved 29 September 2025.
  49. ↑ Koval Painter, Margaret. "Margaret Koval Painter". Margaret Koval Painter. Retrieved 29 September 2025.

Creative Commons by small.svg  This article incorporates text available under the CC BY 4.0 license.

Academic offices
Preceded by31st President of Corpus Christi College, Oxford
2016 – 2018		Next:
Helen Moore
Preceded by
Richard J. Hawryluk (interim)
7th Director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
2018 – present		Incumbent
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.