Dr. Schwantes is a Professor in the Ken and Mary Alice Lindquist Department of Nuclear Engineering at Penn State University working in areas related to aqueous environmental radiochemistry, super-heavy element chemistry and physics, astrophysical nucleosynthesis, science-based stockpile stewardship, nuclear material science and nuclear forensics. Before joining Penn State faculty in 2022, Dr. Schwantes worked as a Senior Research Scientist for the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. He has authored or coauthored 122 publications (79 peer reviewed), was part of the confirmatory team for the discovery of element 111 (subsequently named Roentgenium) and lead a team of researchers in 2009 that identified the oldest known reactor-produced plutonium in the world. Dr. Schwantes currently serves as a Co-Chair of the Exercise Task Group for the Nuclear Forensics International Technical Working Group (ITWG) and is the Lead Subject Matter Expert for the development of an International Training Course on Nuclear Forensic Methodologies for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the European Commission’s Jointe Research Centre (JRC) and the US National Nuclear Security Agency (NNSA). He is a past member of the Washington State Academy of Science (2021-2023), was part of two separate Department of Energy response teams during the 2011 accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear station and recently led the forensic examination following the radioactive contamination resulting from a breach of a 3,000 Ci sealed source during recovery operations on May 2nd, 2019, at the University of Washington Harborview Medical Facility. In 2014, Dr. Schwantes was appointed by the Secretary of Energy to serve as a member of the Technical Assessment Team (TAT), a five-person team charged with investigating a major contamination event at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) that occurred on February 14 of that year. The 40+ scientists he led at PNNL were responsible for bench-scale compatibility testing and ultra-trace analyses of reaction residues collected at the event site. Their efforts identified the underlying reactions responsible for the contamination event, for which nine of his team members and himself were awarded in 2015 the U.S. Department of Energy’s highest non-monetary honor, the Secretary’s Achievement Award.
