Professor Ian Chapman

Professor Ian Chapman is a world leader in fusion energy. He is the current CEO of the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) and is also a former participant at LIYSF.

Professor Chapman joined UKAEA after receiving his M.Sc. in Mathematics and Physics from Durham University and subsequently obtaining a Ph.D. in plasma physics from Imperial College London. He rose in the organisation to become UKAEA’s Head of Tokamak Science in 2014. His research has been recognised with many international awards, including the American Physical Society Thomas H. Stix Award, the Institute of Physics Paterson Medal and the Royal Society Kavli Medal. He chairs the IAEA Fusion Research Committee.

He leads UK’s national research endeavors in advancing fusion experiments and developing related technologies, with the mission of delivering commercial fusion energy to the world. In addition to being part of the ITER collaboration, he has pioneered the UK’s new national fusion project to construct a smaller, more cost-effective tokamak with a more spherical shape and solved several important technical problems surrounding the design. The methods he proposed to improve plasma stability were adopted by ITER—the world’s largest fusion experiment with 35 participating countries—to optimize the design of their tokamak.