William J. Nellis

William J. Nellis (born June 25, 1941) is an American physicist. He is an Associate of the Physics Department of Harvard University. His work has focused on ultra-condensed matter at extreme pressures, densities and temperatures achieved by fast dynamic compression. He is most well-known for the first experimental observation of a metallic phase of dense hydrogen, a material predicted to exist by Eugene Wigner and Hillard Bell Huntington in 1935.

Nellis has been President of the International Association for the Advancement of High Pressure Science and Technology (AIRAPT) and Chairman of the American Physical Society (APS) Topical Group on Shock Compression of Condensed Matter. He has received the Bridgman Award of AIRAPT, the Duvall Award of APS and is a Fellow of the APS Division of Condensed Matter Physics.

Nellis is an author or coauthor of more than 250 published papers. Most of his research has been focused on materials during or after dynamic compression at high pressures for properties including electrical conductivities, temperatures, equation-of-state data, and shock-wave profiles to investigate compressibilities and phase transitions in liquids and solids. Provided by Wikipedia