The phrase "a principal contributor" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to refer to someone who plays a major role in contributing to a project, research, or any collaborative effort.
Example: "Dr. Smith was a principal contributor to the groundbreaking study on climate change."
Alternatives: "a key contributor" or "a major contributor".
In 2007, Caldeira was a principal contributor to an I.P.C.C. team that won a Nobel Peace Prize.
There is no getting around the fact that lax gun control measures are a principal contributor to gun violence.
The United States' failed war on drugs is thus a principal contributor to violence in Central America.
In 2000, Sam Wyly was a principal contributor to Republicans for Clean Air, a group that bought ads extolling then-Gov.
C. 801 - c. 900 Anthony Of Tagrit, (flourished 9th century) Syrian Orthodox theologian and writer, a principal contributor to the development of Syriac literature and poetry.
Anthony Of Tagrit, (flourished 9th century), Syrian Orthodox theologian and writer, a principal contributor to the development of Syriac literature and poetry.
Rowett was, according to Huntford, "a stodgy, prosaic looking" businessman, who was, in 1920, a co-founder and principal contributor to an animal nutrition research institute in Aberdeen known as the Rowett Research Institute (now part of the University of Aberdeen).
Before and after the onset of the vaccination campaign, the modelled principal component had the respondents' intention to recommend A(H1N1) pandemic vaccine as principal contributor (weight for the "strongly disagree" level: 4.14).
Isaac Chotiner is a staff writer at The New Yorker, where he is the principal contributor to Q. & A., a series of timely interviews with major public figures in politics, media, books, business, technology, and more.
Both the Kennedy children and the Kennedy Library have been in strained discussions with Robert L. White, a longtime fanatical Kennedy collector who is the principal contributor to the auction and consigned the material under dispute.
James R. Milkey, chief of the environmental protection division of the Massachusetts attorney general's office, said the new case was more narrowly focused on what has become a central policy question about global warming: whether the E.P.A. has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide, the principal contributor to global warming, as a pollutant.
