John Simpson is a world-leading γ-ray spectroscopist with expertise in advanced Ge array design.

He was awarded the IoP Rutherford Medal and Prize in 2016 for his “outstanding leadership in the development of new detector technologies and systems for experimental nuclear physics research within the UK and Europe, and for his seminal contributions to our understanding of the structure of atomic nuclei, especially in revealing new properties of nuclei at the limits of angular momentum, deformation, and stability.”

He was the physicist responsible for the design of many European gamma-ray arrays including EUROGAM, EUROBALL, JUROGAM, RISING and EXOGAM. He was the project leader for the EXOGAM project, the project manager for AGATA, Spokesperson of AGATA, Chair of the AGATA collaboration, and vice Chair of the AGATA Steering Committee.

He holds the position of Visiting professor at The University of Liverpool. He has over 335 refereed papers (h-index 46).

He has served on Programme Allocation Panels at IReS, France, NAC/iThemba in South Africa and the University of Jyväskylä, Finland. He was the chairperson of the PAC in Jyväskylä for 2 years.

He has made several leading contributions to high-spin physics, including shape changes, multiple band terminations, pairing correlations, unpaired rotational bands and to the spectroscopy of extremely neutron-deficient nuclei. He leads research programmes in high spin spectroscopy and heavy exotic nuclei.