Teresa Head-Gordon

Head-Gordon was born in Akron, Ohio.^[2] She completed her bachelor's degree in chemistry at Case Western Reserve University in 1983.^[6] She worked as a waitress for a year before starting a PhD in 1984, and in 1989 she earned her doctorate degree in Theoretical Chemistry from Carnegie Mellon University under the supervision of Charles L. Brooks III.^[1][3][6][7]

From 1990 to 1992 Head-Gordon worked as a postdoctoral member of technical staff at Bell Labs, studying protein folding and the perturbation theories of water with Frank Stillinger.^[2][3] She joined Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in 1992, where she worked as a staff scientist until 2001.^[2] In 2001 Head-Gordon was awarded the IBM-SUR Award.^[6] That year she became a faculty member of Bioengineering at University of California, Berkeley.^[6] She was the 2005 Schlumberger Fellow at the University of Cambridge.^[8] In 2011 she became a member of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering department; in 2012 she joined the chemistry department at University of California, Berkeley.,^[6] and joined the chemical sciences division as a faculty scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.^[9] In 2012 she was made the Chancellor's Professor at the University of California, Berkeley.^[6] She is a member of the Pitzer Center for Theoretical Chemistry.^[10]

Head-Gordon develops theoretical models that are used in chemical physics and biophysics.^[11] The Head-Gordon group studies condensed phase systems ranging from biomolecular systems, molecular liquids, and complex interfaces.^{[12][13][14][15]} Her group develops software packages for molecular simulations.^[16][17][18]

She is on the Board of Directors of the Molecular Sciences Software Institute.^[19] She became co-director of CalSov in 2016.^[6] In 2016 she was elected a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering for her contributions to the computational methodologies for macromolecular assemblies.^[5] In 2018 she was elected a Fellow of the American Chemical Society.^[20]