Colin Adams
Director of Experimental Physics
Colin Adams leads Zap Energy's experimental physics team, which designs, diagnoses, and analyzes the experiments that advance the company's sheared-flow-stabilized Z-pinch fusion concept.
Adams began his career as an aerospace engineer before studying plasma physics at the University of Washington, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and the University of New Mexico, where he earned a PhD in Engineering.
In 2015, Adams joined the Aerospace and Ocean Engineering faculty at Virginia Tech, where he rose to Associate Professor, taught plasma physics and aerodynamics, and directed the Experimental Plasma and Propulsion Laboratory, the Hypersonic Wind Tunnel, and the Liquid Metal eXperiment. His research covers magnetic and viscous stabilization of plasmas, gradient-driven diffusion in plasma shocks, Z-pinch flow shear and stability, hypersonic aerodynamics and heating, liquid metal magnetohydrodynamics, pulsed-power switches, hollow cathode plasma sources, and plasma liner formation.