Dr. JungHyun Bae is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Nuclear Engineering and Engineering Physics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. His research focuses on nuclear waste management and the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle, radiation detection and instrumentation, cosmic-ray muon imaging, non-destructive assay, nuclear safeguards and security, and quantum computing applications for nuclear energy.
Before joining UW–Madison, Dr. Bae was a Eugene P. Wigner Distinguished Staff Fellow in the Nuclear Energy and Fuel Cycle Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). He earned his Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from Purdue University.
Dr. Bae has led research projects sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Nuclear Security Administration, and ORNL’s Laboratory Directed Research and Development program. As principal investigator, he has directed projects on nuclear material accountancy and safeguards at geological repositories using muon tomography; momentum-informed muon scattering tomography for imaging spent nuclear fuel casks; cosmic-radiation noise reduction in radiation portal monitors; and the effects of high-energy radiation on superconducting qubits. These projects integrate radiation detection, particle-transport modeling, advanced image reconstruction, and experimental validation to address challenges in nuclear safeguards, waste management, security, and quantum information science.
He has also contributed to DOE-sponsored projects involving cosmic-ray muon measurements at underground research facilities, vacuum-drying experiments for simulated damaged nuclear fuel, and the development of ultrasound-based flow-diagnostic capabilities. His broader research includes compact Cherenkov muon spectrometers, radiation-source localization and portal-monitor data analysis, high-resolution gamma-ray spectroscopy, thermal-hydraulic analysis of spent-fuel storage systems, and reactor safety analysis using computational fluid dynamics.
Dr. Bae’s research has been featured by the U.S. Department of Energy, and he was recognized in the inaugural Nuclear News “40 Under 40” class. He serves on the executive committees of the American Nuclear Society Young Members Group and Fuel Cycle and Waste Management Division and contributes to the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency Global Forum on Nuclear Education, Science, Technology and Policy.