Dr. James Johnson is an experimental physicist with a strong background in optics.  In 2016, he retired as PV Technical Strategist from the GE Global Research Center in Niskayuna, NY.  While there, James was engaged in the implementation of solar energy for GE.  He has 25 years of experience in thin film process development and characterization.  James led the technical evaluation of photovoltaic approaches and pioneered second-generation PV at GE.  He also worked on advanced device design and was part of the team that set multiple world records for thin film PV efficiency.

James was a principal contributor to intellectual property development at GE and holds 17 U.S. patents. He developed a statistically-based supply and demand model to forecast rare Earth element sustainability, an approach used as a best practice for evaluating strategic materials.

James received his B.S. in Physics from the University of Texas at Dallas in 1990, where he graduated magna cum laude.  He was awarded his Ph.D. in Physics at UTD in 1994 for the design, fabrication, and testing of plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposited diamond-like carbon thin films.  After graduating, James worked at the U.S. Army Night Vision Labs in Ft. Belvoir, Virginia, where he developed electron cyclotron resonance plasma processing and real-time spectroscopic ellipsometry for the fabrication of advanced infrared focal plane arrays.

James enjoys amateur astronomy and performance vehicles.  He is living a quiet life with his wife and dog in upstate New York.