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Meet the KAISTian of 2017, Professor YongKeun Park
Professor YongKeun Park from the Department of Physics is one of the star professors in KAIST. Rising to the academic stardom, Professor Park’s daily schedule is filled with series of business meetings in addition to lab meetings and lectures.
The year 2017 must have been special for him. During the year, he published numerous papers in international journals, such as Nature Photonics, Nature Communications and Science Advances. These high performances drew international attention from renowned media, including Newsweek and Forbes. Moreover, recognizing his research performance, he was elected as a fellow member of the Optical Society (OSA) in his mid-30s. Noting that the members’ age ranges from late 50s to early 60s, Professor Park’s case considered to be quite exceptional.
Adding to his academic achievement, he has launched two startups powered of his own technologies. One is called Tomocube, a company specialized in 3-D imaging microscope using holotomography technology. His company is currently exporting the products to multiple countries, including the United States and Japan. The other one is The.Wave.Talk which has technologies for examining pre-existing bacteria anywhere and anytime.
His research career and entrepreneurship are well deserved recipient of many honors. At the 2018 kick-off ceremony, Professor Park was awarded the KAISTian of 2017 in recognition of his developing holographic measure and control technology as well as founding a new field for technology application.
KAISTian of the Year, first presented in 2001, is an award to recognize the achievements and exemplary contribution of KAIST member who has put significant effort nationally and internationally, enhancing the value of KAIST.
While receiving the award, he thanked his colleagues and his students who have achieved this far together. He said, “I would like to thank KAIST for providing environment for young professors like me so that we can engage themselves in research. Also, I would like to mention that I am an idea seeder and my students do the most of the research. So, I appreciate my students for their hard works, and it is very pleasure to have them. Lastly, I thank the professors for teaching these outstanding students. I feel great responsibility over this title. I will dedicate myself to make further progress in commercializing technology in KAIST.”
Expecting his successful startup cases as a model and great inspiration to students as well as professors, KAIST interviewed Professor Park.
Q What made you decide to found your startups?
A I believed that my research areas could be further used. As a professor, I believe that it is a university’s role to create added value through commercializing technology and creating startups.
Q You have co-founded two startups. What is your role in each company?
A So, basically I have two full-time jobs, professor in KAIST and CTO in Tomocube. After transferring the technology, I hold the position of advisor in The.Wave.Talk.
(Holographic images captured by the product Professor Park developed)
Q Do your students also participate in your companies or can they?
A No, the school and companies are separate spaces; in other words, they are not participating in my companies. They have trained my employees when transferring the technologies, but they are not directly working for the companies.
However, they can participate if they want to. If there’s a need to develop a certain technology, an industry-academia contract can be made. According to the agreement, students can work for the companies.
Q Were there any hardships when preparing the startups?
A At the initial stage, I did not have a financial problem, thanks to support from Startup KAIST. Yet, inviting capital is the beginning, and I think every step I made to operate, generate revenue, and so on is not easy.
Q Do you believe KAIST is startup-friendly?
A Yes, there’s no school like KAIST in Korea and any other country. Besides various programs to support startup activities, Startup KAIST has many professors equipped with a great deal of experience. Therefore, I believe that KAIST provides an excellent environment for both students and professors to create startups.
Q Do you have any suggestion to KAIST institutionally?
A Well, I would like to make a comment to students and professors in KAIST. I strongly recommend them to challenge themselves by launching startups if they have good ideas. Many students wish to begin their jobs in government-funded research institutes or major corporates, but I believe that engaging in a startup company will also give them valuable and very productive experience.
Unlike before, startup institutions are well established, so attracting good capital is not so hard. There are various activities offered by Startup KAIST, so it’s worthwhile giving it a try.
Q What is your goal for 2018 as a professor and entrepreneur?
A I don’t have a grand plan, but I will work harder to produce good students with new topics in KAIST while adding power to my companies to grow bigger.
By Se Yi Kim from the PR Office
2018.01.03 View 9922 -
Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee Named NAI Fellow
(Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee)
Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering was named to the National Academy of Inventors in the US. He is the first Korean scholar ever elected as a NAI fellow.
The NAI is a non-profit member organization with over 4,000 individual inventors and fellows spanning more than 250 institutions worldwide. It is comprised of universities as well as governmental and non-profit research institutes. The academy was founded in 2010 to recognize and encourage inventors with patents from the US Patent and Trademark Office. So far, 575 fellows from 229 institutions have been elected.
The academy said Professor Lee has been recognized for fellowship induction as he has demonstrated a highly prolific spirit of innovation in creating or facilitating outstanding inventions that have made a tangible impact on quality of life, economic development, and the welfare of society.
Distinguished Professor Lee, a pioneering researcher and scholar in the field of systems metabolic engineering, was ranked in the top 1% of highly cited researchers (HCR) this year. Over the past 11 years, he published more than 130,000 articles in prestigious journals around the world. He has been cited more than 34,000 times since he started working at KAIST in 1994.
He is also the first Korean ever elected to both the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) in the US, becoming the one of 13 foreign scholars in the world holding two prestigious institutions’ fellowships.
Dr. Lee is currently the dean of KAIST Institutes, the world-leading institute for multi and interdisciplinary research. He is also serving as co-chair of the Global Council on Biotechnology and is a member of the Global Future Council on the Fourth Industrial Revolution at the World Economic Forum.
2017.12.13 View 7254 -
KAIST International Community Celebrates the Year-End
KAIST international community all gathered in celebration of the year-end on December 5 at the KAIST auditorium. This year, the community made the year-end party very special, expressing their appreciation very touching way at the event hosted by the International Scholar and Student Services (ISSS). Nearly 650 international faculty, students, and their family members joined the party.
Currently, 184 faculty members and researchers from 29 countries are working at KAIST, with 901 international students from 92 countries enrolled.
The two-hour party offered them a chance to enjoy a wide variety of activities and events, including dance performances, student performances, games, and dinner.
The party also had a meaningful award ceremony. Prior to the event, a month-long survey was conducted, asking international scholars and students which on-campus team they were most thankful for this year. Candidates for the appreciation award were: Safety and Security Team, Student Affairs Team, Campus Police, dormitory supervisors, and campus cleaning staff.
Approximately 470 scholars and students responded to the survey and 214 voted for the campus cleaning staff (45.5%).
(President Sung-Chul Shin and Myeongja Kim)
Ms. Myeongja Kim, a director of the cleaning staff in the undergraduate zone, received the award on behalf of the entire cleaning staff. At the ceremony, President Sung-Chul Shin conferred the award.
President Shin in his welcoming remarks said that globalization is his priority and urgent mission. To make KAIST more globalized, he said he will focus on three agendas; to make the campus KAIST a more welcoming environment for international community; to make campus more inclusive and diverse; to enhance the global visibility of KAIST more proactively. Click for the full text of opening remarks
2017.12.11 View 5001 -
A New Spin Current Generating Material Developed
(Professor Park(left) and Ph.D. candidate Kim)
Magnetic random-access memory (MRAM) is a non-volatile device made of thin magnetic film that can maintain information without an external power supply, in contrast to conventional silicon-based semiconductor memory. It also has the potential for high-density integration and high-speed operation.
The operation of MRAM involves the control of the magnetization direction by exerting spin current-induced torque on a magnetic material. Spin current is generated using electricity in conventional MRAM, but this study developed materials technology that generates spin current using heat.
A KAIST research team led by Professor Byong-Guk Park of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering developed a material that generates spin current from heat, which can be utilized for a new operation principle for MRAM.
There have been theoretical reports on the spin Nernst effect, the phenomenon of the thermal generation of spin current, but is yet to have been experimentally proven due to technological limitations. However, the research team introduced a spin Nernst magnetoresistance measurement method using tungsten (W) and platinum (Pt) with high spin orbit coupling which allows for the experimental identification of the spin Nernst effect. They also demonstrated that the efficiency of spin current generation from heat is similar to that of spin current generated from electricity.
Professor Park said, “This research has great significance in experimentally proving spin current generation from heat, a new physical phenomenon. We aim to develop the technology as a new operational method for MRAM through further research. This can lower power consumption, and is expected to contribute to the advancement of electronics requiring low power requirement such as wearable, mobile, and IOT devices”.
This research was conducted as a joint research project with Professor Kyung-Jin Lee at Korea University and Professor Jong-Ryul Jeong at Chungnam National University. It was published in Nature Communications online on November 9 titled “Observation of transverse spin Nernst magnetoresistance induced by thermal spin current in ferromagnet/non-magnet bilayers.” Ph.D. candidate Dong-Jun Kim at KAIST is the first author. This research was funded by the Ministry of Science and ICT.
(Schematic diagram of spin Nernst magnetoresistance)
(Research result of new spin current generating materials)
2017.12.08 View 7275 -
Technology Detecting RNase Activity
(Ph.D. candidate Chang Yeol Lee)
A KAIST research team of Professor Hyun Gyu Park at Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering developed a new technology to detect the activity of RNase H, a RNA degrading enzyme. The team used highly efficient signal amplification reaction termed catalytic hairpin assembly (CHA) to effectively analyze the RNase H activity. Considering that RNase H is required in the proliferation of retroviruses such as HIV, this research finding could contribute to AIDS treatments in the future, researchers say.
This study led by Ph.D. candidates Chang Yeol Lee and Hyowon Jang was chosen as the cover for Nanoscale (Issue 42, 2017) published in 14 November.
The existing techniques to detect RNase H require expensive fluorophore and quencher, and involve complex implementation. Further, there is no way to amplify the signal, leading to low detection efficiency overall. The team utilized CHA technology to overcome these limitations. CHA amplifies detection signal to allow more sensitive RNase H activity assay.
The team designed the reaction system so that the product of CHA reaction has G-quadruplex structures, which is suitable to generate fluorescence. By using fluorescent molecules that bind to G-quadruplexes to generate strong fluorescence, the team could develop high performance RNase H detection method that overcomes the limitations of existing techniques. Further, this technology could screen inhibitors of RNase H activity.
The team expects that the research finding could contribute to AIDS treatment. AIDS is disease caused by HIV, a retrovirus that utilizes reverse transcription, during which RNA is converted to DNA. RNase H is essential for reverse transcription in HIV, and thus inhibition of RNase H could in turn inhibit transcription of HIV DNA.
Professor Park said, “This technology is applicable to detect various enzyme activities, as well as RNase H activity.” He continued, “I hope this technology could be widely used in research on enzyme related diseases.”
This study was funded by Global Frontier project and Mid-career Researcher Support project of the Ministry of Science and ICT.
2017.11.28 View 6215 -
Professor Je-Kyun Park, Awarded by The Korean BioChip Society
On November 9, Je-Kyun Park from the Department of Bio and Brain Engineering at KAIST received an award from the 2017 Fall Meeting of The Korean BioChip Society held in Paradise Hotel Busan, Korea. This year’s meeting recognized Professor Park for developing lab-on-a-chip and microfluidic analytical technologies.
The Korean BioChip Society is a corporation of biochip professional established in 2006 for the development of biochip technology. Every year, the Society selects a recipient based on the nominees’ academic achievements and contributions to bio-fusion industry.
Professor Park served on the international editorial boards of renowned international journals in related fields, including Biosensors and Bioelectronics and Lab on a Chip. He was also the Committee Chairman of MicroTas in 2015.
2017.11.22 View 6832 -
LG's Woo Jong Lee Named the Alumnus of College of Engineering
The College of Engineering at KAIST selected Woo Jong Lee, President and Head of the VC Business Division at LG Electronics Inc., as the 2017 Alumnus of the Year for the College of Engineering.
‘Alumnus of the Year’ is an award given to a distinguished alumnus who has contributed to the development of industrial technology or made outstanding academic achievements.
Lee graduated from KAIST with the master’s degrees in Industrial Engineering. He also worked at Daewoo Motors as an executive member in the development division. He has been a crucial human resource for LG since he joined the company in 2000.
While leading the VC business Division, which was established in 2013, Lee is recognized as a creative engineer as well as a leader in the automotive industry. Focusing on autonomous driving and eco-friendliness, he has been engaged in the production of major projects from the beginning to the end.
Since 2014, outstanding alumni whose achievements have represented KAIST at the highest level have received the award. The first recipient was Tae-Kyung Yoo, an executive at Lumens Co., Ltd., and the second recipient was Jung-Ju Kim, the founder of NXC. In 2016, the award was not given because an appropriate candidate could not be identified.
The award was held in the Industrial Engineering & Management Building (E2) on November 8. Faculty members including the dean of the College of Engineering Jong-Hwan Kim, the vice dean Hyochoong Bang, the head of Industrial & Systems Engineering Taesik Lee, and the dean of the KAIST Academy Tae-Eog Lee attended the ceremony.
After the ceremony, Lee delivered a lecture on ‘Auto-components Business of LG Electronics’ to KAIST students.
2017.11.09 View 7177 -
College of Business Honored with the WRDS-SSNR Innovation Award
(Professor Inmoo Lee (far left), Robert Zarazowski (WRDS), Gregg Gordon (SSRN) and Professor Jae Kyu Lee)
The KAIST College of Business received the WRDS (Wharton Research Data Services)-SSNR Innovation Award for the Asia-Pacific region on October 31 during the AACSB Asia-Pacific Conference in Seoul.
The WRDS-SSRN Innovation Award is intended to elevate the visibility of pioneering research across a broad range of financial and economic topics. Three winners are selected annually from across North America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific based on their ability to demonstrate innovation and research excellence.
The award was created through collaboration with SSRN, the world’s leading early-stage research platform and Elsevier, a global information analytics company specializing in science and health. It honors top business schools that produce exceptional data-driven research. A part of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, WRDS provides global corporations, universities, and regulatory agencies with the thought leadership, data access, and analytics needed to enable impactful research.
The Dean of the College of Business Youngbae Kim, said that KAIST has been taking the lead in responding to global trends, offering many innovative programs such as an MBA for Social Entrepreneurship and the Master Course for Green Growth Management. KAIST already has been selected as the Most Innovative University in the Asia-Pacific Region by Thomson Reuters for the last two years.
Robert Zarazowski, managing director of WRDS said they recognize and support the outstanding achievement taking place at KAIST as well as its commitment to growth and innovation in business education.
2017.11.03 View 6116 -
Scientist of November, Professor Hyung Jin Sung
Professor Hyung Jin Sung from the Department of Mechanical Engineering at KAIST received a ‘Science and Technology Award of the Month’ given by the Ministry of ICT and Science and the National Research Foundation of Korea for November 2017. He developed technology that can exquisitely control a micrometer-scaled liquid drop on a dime-sized lab-on-a-chip. With his work, he was recognized for reinforcing research capability on microfluidics.
Lab-on-a-chip is an emerging experiment and diagnostic technology in the form of a bio-microchip that facilitates complex and various experiments with only a minimal sample size required. This technology draws a lot of attention not only from medical and pharmaceutical areas, but also the health and environmental field. The biggest problem was that technology for the temperature control of a fluid sample, which is one of the core technologies in microfluidics, has low accuracy. This limit had to be overcome in order to use the lab-on-a-chip more widely.
Professor Sung developed an acoustic and thermal method which controls the temperature of a droplet quickly and meticulously by using sound and energy. This is a thermal method that uses heat generated during the absorption of an acoustic wave into viscoelastic substances. It facilitates a rapid heating rate and spatial-temporal temperature control, allowing heating in desired areas. In addition, Professor Sung applied his technology to polymerase chain reactions, which are used to amplify DNA.
Through this experiment, he successfully shortened the reaction time from 1-2 hours to only three minutes, making this a groundbreaking achievement.
Professor Sung said, “My research is significant for enhancing the applicability of microfluidics. I expect that it will lead to technological innovations in healthcare fields including biochemistry, medical checkups, and new medicine development.”
2017.11.03 View 8167 -
In Jin Cho Earned the Best Poster Prize at ME Summit 2017
In Jin Cho, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at KAIST received the best poster prize at the International Metabolic Engineering Summit 2017 held on October 24 in Beijing, China.
The International Metabolic Engineering Summit is a global conference where scientists and corporate researchers in the field of metabolic engineering present their latest research outcomes and build networks.
At this year’s summit, about 500 researchers from around the world participated in active academic exchanges, including giving keynote speeches and presenting posters.
During the poster session, the summit selects one person for the KeAi-synthetic and Systems Biotechnology Poster Award, two for Microbial Cell Factories Poster Awards, and three for Biotechnology Journal Poster Awards among the posters presented by graduate students, post-doctoral fellows and researchers. Cho received the KeAi-synthetic and Systems Biotechnology Poster Award. Her winning poster is on the biotransformation of p-xylene to terephthalic acid using engineered Escherichia coli.
Terephthalic acid is generally produced by p-xylene oxidation; however, this process requires a high temperature and pressure as well as a toxic catalyst during the reaction process.
Cho and Ziwei Luo, a Ph.D. student at KAIST, co-conducted the research and developed a successful biological conversion process. Compared to the existing chemical process, it does not require a high temperature and pressure; and it is environmentally friendly with a relatively high conversion rate of approximately 97%.
Cho’s advisor, Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee said, “Further research on glucose-derived terephthalic acid will enable us to produce biomass-based eco-friendly terephthalic acid through engineered Escherichia coli.”
2017.10.31 View 8012 -
Distinguished Professor Lee Named International Fellow of the CAS
Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee from the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at KAIST was awarded the title of distinguished professor and international fellow from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), and honorary professor from its affiliated organization the Tianjin Institute of Industrial Biotechnology (TIB).
The CAS recognized Distinguished Professor Lee for his significant contributions to biotechnology. He has made significant pioneering academic achievements in the area of systems metabolic engineering, which produces useful chemicals from microorganisms. Not only did he develop the first and best source technology in that field, but also came out with processes for the production of biofuel and environmentally-friendly chemicals.”
As a global leader in systems metabolic engineering, Distinguished Professor Lee has also been appointed as an honorary professor at Jiangnan University in Wuxi, China.
Distinguished Professor Lee was listed in the ‘Top 20 Translational Researchers of 2014’ selected by the renowned international journal Nature Biotechnology. Moreover, he was the first Asian recipient of the James E. Bailey Award in 2016 and Marvin J. Johnson Award in 2012, which are given to scholars in the field of biotechnology.
He is also one of 13 global scientists who are foreign members of the renowned academic societies the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Sciences in the US. Furthermore, he received the ‘2017 Korea Best Scientist Award’ from the president of Korea in July. Finally, his founding field, systems metabolic engineering, was chosen as one of the ‘Top 10 Emerging Technologies of 2016’ by the World Economic Forum.
The Chinese Academy of Sciences, established in November 1949, is an academic organization that carries out research on basic sciences and natural sciences in China. It defined its science and technology system to include the fields of basic sciences, natural sciences, and high technology. While having a base in Beijing, its branch academies are located in 12 main cities along with 117 affiliates and 100 national key labs.
2017.10.26 View 9611 -
Professor Dai Gil Lee Recognized by the ICCS
Emeritus Professor Dai Gil Lee, from the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at KAIST, received a special achievement award from the 20th International Conference on Composite Structures (ICCS).
ICCS is a renowned conference in the field of applied composite structures, which highlights the practicality of composite structures. This year, the conference was held at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (CNAM), Paris, France from September 4 to 7. Approximately 650 papers were presented from 45 countries.
Especially, the conference honored Emeritus Professor Lee, who has been engaged in ICCS since 1993 and received best paper award twice. The ICCS recognized him for serving with distinction in science and technology in the fields of composite materials and structures. As a member of the Editorial Board for many years, he gave significant support to the journal Composite Structures. At the conference, he gave a special lecture titled ‘Lightweight Carbon Composite Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells’.
Professor Lee said, “I will dedicate myself to innovate Vanadium Redox Flow Battery-ESS (VRFB) based on the research findings announced at the conference and related patents. I am hoping that these efforts will contribute to solving energy issues around the world.”
2017.10.19 View 6574