Jiankai Yu

Jiankai Yu is a research scientist at the Center of Nuclear Energy Systems (CANES) in the department of Nuclear Science and Engineering at MIT. He has published over 20 journal articles and over 20 conference papers in the field of reactor physics, neutronic/thermal-hydraulic/fuel-performance coupling, and Deep Learning-based autonomous control system. During his research at MIT, Jiankai completed the major part of one DOE-NEUP project entitled “Demonstrating Reactor Autonomous Control Framework using Graphite Pile” at MIT Nuclear Reactor Laboratory. He developed the Deep Learning algorithm driven neutronic reactivity control framework that integrates digital twin, neutron detectors and microcontroller devices, which work has been highlighted by IAEA technical report(IAEA-TECDOC-1976).

• MIT Outstanding postdoctoral service award, 2022
• Best Poster Prize in the KNS2018 Spring Meeting, 2018
• Best student paper award in Reactor Physics Asia 2017 Conference, 2017
• The Winner in the ICONE23 Student Best Poster Competition, 2015
• The Winner in the ICONE-22 Student Best Poster Competition, 2014

High-fidelity Neutronic Modeling and Simulations

He has been intensively working on the high-fidelity neutronic modeling and simulations for diverse irradiation experiment facilities for the MIT research reactor (MITR), including but not limited to ICSA, HTWL, 3GV, pneumatic tube (2PH1), fission converter and the associated M³ and medical room.

Monte Carlo Neutron Transport

He optimized the modeling and simulation capability of OpenMC code for pebble-bed high temperature reactors (HTRs), including TRISO particle packing, lattice acceleration and white boundary condition. He implemented and extended the depletion capability of OpenMC with spatially continuously varying materials without mesh dependency. He also optimized the Windowed Multipole Library (WMP) for on-the-fly Doppler broadening capability in OpenMC code.

Multiphysics Modeling and Simulations

Moreover, he has developed a high-fidelity multiphysics coupling system for the large-scale commercial water reactors core design and analysis. Monte Carlo Neutronics-Thermal/Hydraulic-Fuel/Performance coupling system has been developed and performed the complete two-cycle full-core depletion analysis for the BEAVRS benchmark with multiphysics feedback.

Charged Particles Beam Transport

The high-fidelity modeling and simulations of charged particles, such as proton and deuteron beams in the 10s MeV ~ 1GeV energy range, has been performed to design the fusion neutron source and the long-live fission product transmutation.