Rate My Professor Juijen Wang

Juijen (Ryan) Wang is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at The University of Alabama, having joined the faculty in 2021. He earned his Ph.D. in experimental particle physics from the University of New Mexico in 2017. Prior to his appointment at Alabama, Wang was a postdoctoral researcher at Brandeis University from 2017 to 2020 and at the University of Michigan from 2020 to 2021. As principal investigator, he leads a research group that includes graduate students, postdoctoral scholars, and undergraduates focused on dark matter direct detection and detector development.

Wang's research centers on experimental particle physics, specifically developing detector techniques for direct dark matter detection to discover and understand dark matter, which constitutes about 25% of the Universe's mass. His work involves research and development of liquid noble gas and liquid scintillator detectors, including characterization and data analysis. He participates in the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) experiment using a dual-phase liquid xenon time projection chamber and liquid scintillator outer detector, as well as veto detectors for future dark matter and neutrino experiments. Group projects include LZ efforts at SURF and water-based liquid scintillator R&D. Wang has co-authored key publications such as "First dark matter search results from the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) experiment" (2022), "The LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) experiment" (2020), "A next-generation liquid xenon observatory for dark matter and neutrino physics" (2023), "Dark Matter Search Results from ... of Exposure of the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) Experiment" (2025), and "Measurement of ν-electron scattering cross section with a CsI(Tl) scintillating crystal array at the Kuo-Sheng nuclear power reactor" (2010). These contributions advance dark matter detection technologies.