Richard L. Ward, PhD, was born and educated through undergraduate training in Montana. He completed a PhD degree in biochemistry at the University of California, Berkeley in 1969 and conducted post-doctoral research in Munich, Germany and the Roche Institute in Nutley, NJ.

Dr. Ward held positions at the University of California in Los Angeles and Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, NM, before joining the USEPA in Cincinnati in 1980. After that he joined the Gamble Institute of Medical Research (1981) and Children's Hospital Medical Center (1995). His entire research career has been on viral studies.