Dr. Jean-Paul Allain
Department Head of the Ken and Mary Alice Lindquist Department of Nuclear Engineering
The Pennsylvania State University
allain@psu.edu
About Dr. Jean-Paul Allain
Prof. Allain is Professor and Department Head of the Ken and Mary Alice Lindquist Department of Nuclear Engineering. Dr. Allain was Professor and Associate Head of Graduate Programs in the Department of Nuclear, Plasma and Radiological Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) from 2013 until 2019 and was Assistant and Associate Professor in Nuclear Engineering at Purdue University from 2007 to 2013. Dr. Allain was also a staff scientist at Argonne National Laboratory from 2003 to 2007. He received a master's and a doctorate in Nuclear Engineering from UIUC and a B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Cal Poly Pomona. Prof. Allain works in areas of surface science and plasma-material interactions with applications in nuclear fusion, plasma medicine, and advanced nanomaterials. Prof. Allain is the recipient of numerous awards, including Argonne National Lab's Distinguished Award from 2003 to 2006, Best Teacher Awards in 2008 at Purdue and 2013 at Illinois, Department of Energy Early Career Award in 2010, Purdue Research Excellence Award in 2011, the Fulbright Scholar Award in 2015, Faculty Entrepreneurial Fellow in 2016, Grainger Engineering Dean's Excellence in Research Award in 2017 at Illinois, the 2018 American Nuclear Society Fusion Energy Division Technology Accomplishment Award, elevated to IEEE Senior Member in 2019 and received the Huck Endowed Chair in Plasma Medicine in 2019.
Abstract
Harnessing energy from nuclear fusion was defined by the National Academy of Engineering as one of the grand challenges to humanity this century in 2008. In addition, several studies by the National Academies culminated in recommendations leading to a fusion pilot plant to be built in the U.S. More recently, the White House established a bold decadal vision for commercial fusion energy. In the past decade, there has been private capital investment culminating in more than $4B of investment in recent years of startups looking to accelerate the commercialization path toward generating energy from nuclear fusion reactions. Amid all this attention and excitement, the question remains what role, in any, could nuclear fusion play in the transition to deep decarbonization and its impact on sustainability. More importantly, emerging technologies are being identified to close several technology gaps that keep fusion energy from the grid. This talk will summarize recent progress in nuclear fusion, emerging game-changing technologies, and remaining challenges to realize generating energy from a star here on earth. Furthermore, the challenges to deep decarbonization and sustainable development in the next few decades and the role of advanced nuclear will also be highlighted