International Conference on Physics of Reactors 2024 Plenary SPeaker

Mark DeHart, PhD

Directorate Fellow,
Nuclear Science and Technology,
Senior Reactor Physicist,
Idaho National Laboratory (INL)

Mark DeHart, PhD, is a Directorate Fellow, Nuclear Science and Technology, and a Senior Reactor Physicist at Idaho National Laboratory (INL). He is the Chair of the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency, sanctioned International Reactor Physics Experiment Evaluation Project (IRPhE) Technical Working Group. He currently leads a multiphysics analysis team performing simulations of nuclear thermal propulsion transient simulations for reactor concepts and supports NASA staff in their own evaluations. Between 2019 and 2023 he led a design team for development of pre-conceptual designs for extending thermal irradiation capabilities for the future. Over the past several years DeHart has led a team of reactor physicists and computational methods staff performing applied multiphysics methods for numerous advanced reactor designs (including pebble bed, high-temperature gas, molten salt designs), support of industrial microreactor design efforts, and modeling/simulation efforts for INL’s Advanced Test Reactor and Transient Test Reactor. Dr. DeHart joined INL in 2010 from ORNL. He is the primary author of the NEWT lattice physics code and the TRITON lattice physics and depletion sequence within the SCALE code system and led development of modern lattice physics methods at ORNL. Dr. DeHart has extensive experience in reactor physics, criticality safety, depletion and spent fuel characterization, cross-section processing, and computer code verification and validation. He holds BS, MS, and Ph.D. degrees in nuclear engineering from Texas A&M University and is a Fellow of the American Nuclear Society (ANS). He is the current chair of the ANS 19.5 Standard Working Group and is a past Chair of the ANS Reactor Physics Division (2013-2014). He has more than 200 publications in journals, conference proceedings, and national laboratory reports related to computational methods and applications in reactor physics, multi-physics, radiation transport, criticality safety, and depletion methods for spent nuclear fuel.