Can I take on an academic pseudonym while publishing research papers or take initials of my name? Is it possible?
The common way to publish is &quot;Surname, N.&quot; (not the unique). So it will be read. How ever you should evaluate all the facts before, and consider why you think it's embarrassing.
There's no trouble about publishing with a nickname, in fact, many people has done it, but there's no guarantee that it won't bring you other problems:

accessing conferences. Many conferences wil ask for your passport to receive your access ID.
having to answer for two surnames
having accounts with different surnames
The most difficult: demonstrate that you are your nickname. There's no legal entity which does that.

However, at the Q3, Q2, Q1 conferences are not a high school. You'll find people from around the world, with high education, whose companies, universities or themselves have payed from $500-$5000 and will be looking for the contents of your article, not your Surname.
Decades ago, Chinese authors used nicknames and they had this kind of problems. They changed Peng/Yang/Ming/Wung, for Atkinson/Eastwood/Anderson/Banks. But, fortunately, nowadays you can find thousands of articles with asian surnames and shared without shame. The Academic community will look at your contents first. If it has quality contents, then look at the authors to remember it.