Lawrence Woolf is a technical fellow at General Atomics (GA) Aeronautical Systems, Inc. in San Diego. He received a Ph.D. in low temperature condensed matter physics from UCSD in 1980 and a BA in physics from Rutgers College in 1975. Woolf joined GA in 1982 after a post-doc at Exxon. He has been project manager or lead scientist for over 50 programs involving the design, development, and/or production of a variety of advanced materials. He is the author or co-author of 73 scientific publications in materials physics and energy conversion systems, holds 24 patents, and is a Fellow of the American Physical Society.

He is also President and Chairman of the Board of the GA Sciences Education Foundation, where he initiated the GASSSS program that has catalyzed the involvement of over 900 employees in K-12 STEM education outreach, brought the TutorMate program to GA, and has managed the disbursement of over $900,000 in funding to STEM non-profits. He has developed many educational modules, materials, and posters and has given over 100 workshops to teachers and students. He was curriculum advisor/technical reviewer for multiple Lawrence Hall of Science FOSS middle school modules and for the BSCS Science: An Inquiry Approach integrated high school curriculum. He developed partnerships between GA and UCSD that has led to financial support for undergraduate research in the Schools of Physical Sciences and Engineering, as well as mentoring and technical interactions.

He has been a member of 25 NSF education related committees, ranging from elementary science education to national laboratory reviews. He has been involved in many APS education committees and activities, including the Forum on Education (as chair), Second and Fourth Graduate Education in Physics Conference, APS Excellence in Physics Education Award selection committee, and J-TUPP/Phys21 and BPUPP/EP3 task forces.  He is currently a member of the Committee on Education (as chair), the EP3 Editorial Board, the US member of IUPAP Working Group 16 on Physics and Industry and a Member-At-Large of the NAS U.S. Liaison Committee for IUPAP.