Hari Harilal is the chief scientist in the National Security Directorate at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory located in Washington state. His research expertise is in laser-plasma interaction, plasma-material interaction, plasma diagnostics, plasma chemistry, plasma and fireball spectroscopy, plasma sources for lithography and microscopy, and materials under extreme environments. In 1998, Hari received a PhD in plasma physics from Cochin University of Science and Technology, India. He was an Alexander Humboldt fellow with the eminent plasma physicist, Professor Hans-Joachim Kunze at Ruhr University of Bochum, Germany 1999–2001. Before joining PNNL in 2014, he worked as an associate professor at the School of Nuclear Engineering, Purdue University, Indiana (2008–2014) and was a member of the fusion group at the University of California San Diego, California (2001–2007). Hari also holds an affiliate research professor position at the Department of Chemistry, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington. He held the Science Foundation of Ireland visiting fellow position at University College Dublin, Ireland (2007–2010) and was a visiting scientist at the Argonne National Laboratory, Illinois (2007).

Hari is a recipient of numerous prestigious awards, which include the Alexander von Humboldt fellowship (Germany), CSIR junior and senior research fellowships (India), Paul C. Zmola Faculty Scholar of Nuclear Engineering Award (Purdue University) and excellence in research awards from PNNL and Purdue University. He has authored over 200 peer-reviewed publications and five book chapters. He is a fellow of the SPIE and Optical Society of America (now Optica), associate editor of Optics Express, Spectrochimica Acta B and guest editor of IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science.