Pablo Rodriguez-fernandez
Principal Research Scientist at Plasma Science and Fusion Center at MIT
Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
Summary
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Senior🎓
Top SchoolPablo Rodriguez-fernandez is a Principal Research Scientist and group leader at MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center with nine years of hands-on experience in tokamak integrated modeling, transport validation, and reactor performance prediction. He led work that resolved a 20-year-old fusion question during his PhD, has supported experiments across major devices (JET, DIII-D, ASDEX Upgrade, Alcator C-Mod), and contributed physics inputs to the SPARC effort. An educator and mentor to students and postdocs, he develops open-science tools (including the PORTALS framework) and applies surrogate-based optimization to accelerate transport research. Recognized on Forbes 30 Under 30 and as a La Caixa Fellow, he blends deep theoretical insight, experimental leadership, and practical engineering from turbomachinery to plasma science. An atypical thread through his career is recurring use of optimization and machine-learning tools to convert complex physics models into actionable predictions for reactor design.
9 years of coding experience
10 years of employment as a software developer
Doctor of Philosophy - PhD Plasma Physics, Doctor of Philosophy - PhD Plasma Physics at Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyMaster of Science - MS Mechanical Engineering, Master of Science - MS Mechanical Engineering at Drexel UniversityIngeniero Técnico Superior en Ingeniería Industrial (Equivalent to BS and MS in Engineering) Energy Engineering, Ingeniero Técnico Superior en Ingeniería Industrial (Equivalent to BS and MS in Engineering) Energy Engineering at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid
Spanish, English, Italian
Github Skills (15)
bayesian10
modeling10
optimization9
plasma-physics9
gaussian9
solver9
stochastic-processes8
machine-learning8
pytorch8
gaussian-processes8
evolutionary7
modular6
evolutionary-algorithms6
python4
gpu-acceleration3
Programming languages (3)
Github contributions (5)
pabloprf/MITIM-fusion
Dec 2023 - Apr 2025
MITIM (MIT Integrated Modeling) Suite for Fusion Applications
Contributions:6 releases, 4 reviews, 53 PRs in 1 year 3 months
bayesian-optimizationfusion-energymodelingplasma-physicssurrogate-based-optimization
pabloprf/PORTALS-tutorial
Mar 2022 - Dec 2023
Contributions:1 PR, 83 pushes, 3 branches in 1 year 9 months
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