William Andrew Goddard III (born March 29, 1937) is the Charles and Mary Ferkel Professor of Chemistry and Applied Physics, and director of the Materials and Process Simulation Center at the

California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small group of institutes ...

Early life and education

William A. Goddard III was born in El Centro California and lived his early years in farm towns across California (El Centro, Delano, Indio, Lodi, Oildale, MacFarland, Firebaugh, also Yuma AZ), where his dad made the wooden boxes used to ship agricultural products. He always dreamed of living in Los Angeles. Goddard earned a BS in engineering from the

University of California at Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the Ca ...

in 1960 and PhD in engineering science with a minor in physics from Caltech in 1964. He has four children (Bill, Suzy, Cecilia, Lisa) and has been married for 58 years.

Career

He joined the chemistry faculty at Caltech in November 1964 where he remains today as a professor and researcher. After his Ph.D. he remained at the

as Arthur Amos Noyes Research Fellow (1964–66), Professor of Theoretical Chemistry (1967–78) and Professor of Chemistry & Applied Physics (1978-). Goddard has made many contributions to theoretical chemistry, such as the

generalized valence bond The generalized valence bond (GVB) is a method in valence bond theory that uses flexible orbitals in the general way used by modern valence bond theory. The method was developed by the group of William A. Goddard, III around 1970. Theory The gen ...

(GVB) method for ''ab initio'' electronic structure calculations and the

ReaxFF ReaxFF (for “reactive force field”) is a bond order-based force field developed by Adri van Duin, William A. Goddard, III, and co-workers at the California Institute of Technology. One of its applications is molecular dynamics simulations. Wh ...

force field for classical molecular dynamics simulations. He is a member of the

International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science The International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science (IAQMS) is an international scientific learned society covering all applications of quantum theory to chemistry and chemical physics. It was created in Menton in 1967. The founding members we ...

and the U.S.

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

. In August 2007, the

American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all ...

at its biannual national convention celebrated Goddard's 70th birthday with a 5-day symposium titled, "Bold predictions in theoretical chemistry." As of November 2017, Goddard has published 1160 peer-reviewed articles.

References

External links

Homepage of William A. Goddard III
1937 births Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Living people people from El Centro, California 21st-century American chemists California Institute of Technology alumni California Institute of Technology faculty Members of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science American theoretical chemists American computational chemists {{US-chemist-stub