Professor
Jong-Kyu Park
Department of Nuclear Engineering, Seoul National University
Ph. D. – Department of Astrophysical Sciences
Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA, 2009
Major: Plasma Physics
M. S. – Department of Nuclear Engineering
Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea, 2002
Major: Plasma Physics
B.S. – Department of Nuclear Engineering
Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea, 2000
Major: Nuclear Engineering
Professor Jong-Kyu Park works in the field of magnetically confined fusion, specializing in three-dimensional plasma physics, neoclassical transport, and the optimization of stellarator and tokamak systems. His research focuses on how 3D magnetic fields influence equilibrium, stability, and transport in toroidal plasmas, and on developing theoretical and computational frameworks that describe these effects in non-axisymmetric configurations.
After receiving his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 2009, he joined the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) directly as research staff, without a postdoctoral appointment, and worked there until 2016, during which he advanced to Principal Research Physicist. He has also taken on leadership roles across several major fusion programs, including international collaborative projects on long-pulse tokamak scenarios supported by the U.S. Fusion Energy Sciences program, research efforts on non-axisymmetric control coil design and macroscopic stability in NSTX and NSTX-U, and service as a U.S. expert in the ITPA MHD Topical Group for activities related to ITER and KSTAR. In addition, he has contributed to Department of Energy task groups and Joint Research Targets addressing plasma response, error-field correction, and broader aspects of 3D magnetic control.
Affiliation
Professor in the Department of Nuclear Engineering, Seoul National University (2023~)
Faculty Lecturer in the Plasma Physics Program –Princeton University (2013~) & Principal Research Physicist – Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (2016~)
Research Physicist – Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (2012~2016)
Staff Physicist – Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (2009~2012)
Awards & Honors
The 2021 Kaul Foundation Award for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research, Princeton University (2021)
ITER Science Fellow on the area of Disruption, and the area of Pedestal Stability and Confinement, ITER Organization (2020 – up to now)
Visiting Professorship, National Institute for Fusion Science, Japan (2013)
Outstanding Young Researcher Award, Association of Korean Physicists in America (2011)
Early Career Award in Fusion Energy Science, Department of Energy (2010)
The 2009 Marshall N. Rosenbluth Award for Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation in Plasma Physics, American Physics Society (2010)
Eugene Wigner Fellowship, Oak Ridge National Laboratory [Declined] (2008)
Excellent Graduate Student Presentation, International Sherwood Fusion Theory Conference (2008)
Selected Publications
J.-K. Park, Optimization of 3D magnetic Perturbations in Tokamaks for Edge Instability Control, Review of Modern Physics 8, 1 (2023)
J.-K. Park, Parametric Dependencies of Resonant Layer Responses Across Two-Fluids Drift MHD regimes, Physics of Plasmas 29, 072506 (2022)
J.-K. Park, S. M. Yang, N. C. Logan, Q. Hu, C. Zhu, M. C. Zarnstorff, C. Paz-Soldan, Y. M. Jeon, W. H. Ko, Quasi-symmetric optimization of non-axisymmetry in tokamaks, Physical Review Letters 126, 125001 (2021)
J.-K. Park, Y. M. Jeon, Y. In, J.-W. Ahn, G. Y. Park, J. H. Kim, H. H. Lee, W. Ko, H. Kim, E. Feibush, Z. R. Wang, N. C. Logan, R. Nazikian and M. Zanstroff, 3D field phase-space control in tokamak plasmas, Nature Physics 14, 1223 (2018)