James Wurster
Senior Computational Scientist
Dunfermline, Scotland, United Kingdom
Summary
👤
Senior🎓
Top SchoolJames Wurster is a Senior Computational Scientist with a PhD in computational astrophysics and nearly two decades of research and development experience, currently applying his expertise at Viper Applied Science from Dunfermline, Scotland. He has a strong track record in high-performance simulation and code development for astrophysical problems—particularly Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics and magnetohydrodynamics—contributing bug fixes and feature enhancements to the widely used Phantom SPH codebase. His career spans research fellowships and teaching roles at St Andrews, Exeter, Monash and Dundee, combining hands-on numerical modeling, large-data analysis and undergraduate instruction. Known for practical problem-solving in legacy Fortran code and physics-driven software design, he bridges academic rigor with applied engineering to deliver reliable simulation tools.
9 years of coding experience
Doctor of Philosophy - PhD, Astronomy, Doctor of Philosophy - PhD, Astronomy at Saint Mary's UniversityBachelor of Science - BS, Mathematics and Physics, Bachelor of Science - BS, Mathematics and Physics at Western UniversityMaster of Science - MS, Astronomy, Master of Science - MS, Astronomy at Queen's University
Github Skills (3)
scientific-computing10
computational-physics10
fortran10
Programming languages (1)
Github contributions (5)
danieljprice/phantom
Feb 2017 - Dec 2022
Phantom Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics and Magnetohydrodynamics code
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:20 reviews, 529 commits, 43 PRs in 5 years 11 months
Contributions summary:James primarily contributed to the Phantom SPH code, focusing on improvements and bug fixes within the Fortran code base. Their work included modifications to the Brio-Wu shock conditions, resolving issues in the summary reporting of sink particle candidates and fixing issues within the code's internal calculations. Additionally, the user made adjustments to the implementation of the magnetic fields and implemented the option to use multiple types of particles.
fluid-solverfluid-dynamicssmoothed-particle-hydrodynamicsastrophysical-simulationastrophysics
jameswurster/phantom
Jun 2020 - May 2023
Phantom Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics and Magnetohydrodynamics code
Contributions:210 pushes in 2 years 11 months
particlemagnetohydrodynamicssmoothed-particle-hydrodynamicsrandom-walkphantom
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