[11] Matthaeus graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a bachelor's degree in physics and philosophy in 1973 on a scholarship from the Mayor of Philadelphia.
[11] His thesis was on "Nonlinear Evolution of the Magnetohydrodynamic Sheet Pinch" and he was supervised by David Campbell Montgomery.
[12] Since 1983, he has been affiliated with the Bartol Research Institute and is currently Unidel Professor of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Delaware.
[17] In 1985, Matthaeus received the James B. MacElwane Award from the American Geophysical Union[18] and became its fellow.
[19] In 2019, he received the James Clerk Maxwell Prize for Plasma Physics for "pioneering research into the nature of turbulence in space and astrophysical plasmas, which has led to major advances in understanding particle transport, dissipation of turbulent energy, and magnetic reconnection".