Engineering
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New Technology Will Enable the Commercialization of Plasmon Displays
-- Enhancements in the penetration ratios of color filters are expected by applying nano-surface plasmon effects. --
-- Color filter technology will be applicable to large-area OLED and LCD. --
The fabrication technology to commercialize display color filters using plasmon effects has been discovered.
A joint research team headed by Professor Kyung Cheol Choi from the Department of Electrical Engineering of the Korea Advanced Institute for Science and Technology and Prof. Byeong-Kwon Ju from the School of Electrical Engineering of Korea University has developed the technology to design and produce a display color filter by applying nano-surface plasmon effects.
Color filters are core components used to express colors in CMOS image sensors found in LCD/OLED displays or digital cameras. The current color filters have penetration ratios of 20~30%, but the objective of the joint research team is to raise this penetration ratio by over 40% to facilitate the mass production of energy-efficient plasmonic displays.
Currently available plasmonic color filters are limited to applications on micrometer scales. However, outcomes of the newest research extend the size of the applications up to 2.5 cm by using laser interference lithography. The academic and industrial sectors agree that it is now possible to mass-produce displays using plasmonic color filters.
The researchers built a nanohole array to large scale by using laser interference lithography, a technology that forms nanostructures with laser light interferences. They also suggested a new manufacturing process that can optimize the features of color filters while compensating for defects arising from the fabrication stages.
The new manufacturing process of applying laser interference lithography is expected to overcome the shortcomings of traditional color filters by simplifying production and, enabling them to be produced at lower costs.
“There were limitations to industrial applications of plasmon effect due to production costs, time, and yields,” explained Yun Seon Do, a Ph. D. candidate in the Department of Electrical Engineering of KAIST. “The new technology can reduce fabrication time and cost to the extent that it would be advisable to replace dye-based and pigment-based color filter technology."
“This research can be applied to large-scale displays, such as TV screens, by using laser-interference lithography,” said Jung-Ho Park, a Ph. D. candidate in the School of Electrical Engineering of Korea University. “The research outcome is expected to be widely applied in advanced nano-manufacturing processes as it does not restrict the types of circuit boards."
The research outcome, led by doctoral candidates Do and Park, appeared on the front cover of the second issue of Advanced Optical Materials, a highly regarded academic journal in the field of nanotechnologies, and the team has applied for six related patents.
2013.03.13 View 9342 -
Prof. Jong Chul Ye Appointed as the Editor of IEEE TIP
Professor Jong Chul Ye
KAIST Bio & brain engineering department’s Professor Jong Chul Ye has been appointed as the editor of the "IEEE image processing transactions (IEEE TIP, IEEE Transaction on Image Processing)’, a prominent journal in the sector of imaging and medical image processing.
Professor Ye will act as the editor in the field of medical imaging from February 2013 to January 2016, during which he will participate in examining thesis, establishing the direction of the journal and more.
Professor Jong Chul Ye was recognized for his notable work in the field of medical imaging research using compressed sensing for the development of a high resolution medical image reconstruction techniques. This technique has pioneered a new area that is applicable in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), computed tomography (CT), positron emission Camcorder (PET) and brain imaging.
On the other hand, “IEEE TIP” was first published in 1992 and is currently the world’s leading authority in the field of image processing, medical imaging, image acquisition, compression and output.
2013.02.21 View 10733 -
New BioFactory Technique Developed using sRNAs
Professor Sang Yup Lee
- published on the online edition of Nature Biotechnology. “Expected as a new strategy for the bio industry that may replace the chemical industry.”-
KAIST Chemical & Biomolecular engineering department’s Professor Sang Yup Lee and his team has developed a new technology that utilizes the synthetic small regulatory RNAs (sRNAs) to implement the BioFactory in a larger scale with more effectiveness.
* BioFactory: Microbial-based production system which creates the desired compound in mass by manipulating the genes of the cell.
In order to solve the problems of modern society, such as environmental pollution caused by the exhaustion of fossil fuels and usage of petrochemical products, an eco-friendly and sustainable bio industry is on the rise. BioFactory development technology has especially attracted the attention world-wide, with its ability to produce bio-energy, pharmaceuticals, eco-friendly materials and more.
For the development of an excellent BioFactory, selection for the gene that produces the desired compounds must be accompanied by finding the microorganism with high production efficiency; however, the previous research method had a complicated and time-consuming problem of having to manipulate the genes of the microorganism one by one.
Professor Sang Yup Lee’s research team, including Dr. Dokyun Na and Dr. Seung Min Yoo, has produced the synthetic sRNAs and utilized it to overcome the technical limitations mentioned above.
In particular, unlike the existing method, this technology using synthetic sRNAs exhibits no strain specificity which can dramatically shorten the experiment that used to take months to just a few days.
The research team applied the synthetic small regulatory RNA technology to the production of the tyrosine*, which is used as the precursor of the medicinal compound, and cadaverine**, widely utilized in a variety of petrochemical products, and has succeeded developing BioFactory with the world’s highest yield rate (21.9g /L, 12.6g / L each).
*tyrosine: amino acid known to control stress and improve concentration
**cadaverine: base material used in many petrochemical products, such as polyurethane
Professor Sang Yup Lee highlighted the significance of this research: “it is expected the synthetic small regulatory RNA technology will stimulate the BioFactory development and also serve as a catalyst which can make the chemical industry, currently represented by its petroleum energy, transform into bio industry.”
The study was carried out with the support of Global Frontier Project (Intelligent Bio-Systems Design and Synthesis Research Unit (Chief Seon Chang Kim)) and the findings have been published on January 20th in the online edition of the worldwide journal Nature Biotechnology.
2013.02.21 View 11787
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KAIST welcomes Dr. Sung-Mo
The KAIST Board of Trustees appointed Distinguished Chair Professor Sung-Mo "Steve" Kang of Electrical Engineering at the University of California, Santa Cruz, as the 15th President of KAIST on January 31, 2013. President Kang has begun the duties of his office on February 23, 2013.
An acclaimed scientist, professor, and entrepreneur in the field of integrated-circuit design, Dr. Sung-Mo "Steve" Kang has earned a worldwide reputation for his outstanding research achievements. He led the development of the world’s first full 32-bit CMOS microprocessor chips and their peripheral chips, as well as designed satellite-based private communication networks while working at AT&T Bell Laboratories as a technical supervisor of high-end microprocessor design group (1977-1985).
Dr. Sung-Mo "Steve" Kang served as Chancellor of the University of California, Merced, from 2007 to 2011. During his tenure, he has increased student enrollment, improved the national and international visibility of the university, secured financial resources, expanded faculty and staff, and enhanced campus infrastructure.
Before joining UC Merced, Dr. Kang was Dean of Baskin School of Engineering and Professor of Electrical Engineering during 2001-2007 at UC Santa Cruz where he had initiated several interdisciplinary programs in such areas as biomolecular engineering, information systems and technology management, biomimetic microelectronic systems, quantitative biomedical research, and bioinformatics. He also served as President of Silicon Valley Engineering Council, the alliance for engineering leaders in Silicon Valley (2002-2003).
Dr. Sung-Mo "Steve" Kang was Head of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 1995 to 2000. He is a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and the president of the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society. Dr. Kang was the founding editor-in-chief of the IEEE Transactions on Very Large Scale Systems (1992-1994).
Dr. Sung-Mo "Steve" Kang holds 15 U.S. patents and has written or co-authored nine books and more than 350 technical papers, and won numerous awards, among others, the Silicon Valley Engineering Hall of Fame (2009), ISQED Quality Award by the International Society for Quality Electronic Design (2008), Chang-Lin Tien Education Leadership Award (2007), IEEE Mac Van Valkenburg Award (2005), and Alexander von Humboldt Award for Senior US Scientists (1997). As an entrepreneur, he co-founded a fabless mobile memory chip design company, ZTI, which is currently located in San Jose, the US.
Dr. Kang earned his doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley; a Master of Science degree from the State University of New York at Buffalo, and a Bachelor of Science degree, graduating summa cum laude, from Fairleigh Dickinson University in Teaneck, NJ. All his academic degrees are in electrical engineering.
2013.02.19 View 12136 -
Professor Shin In Shik First in Asia to receive Excellent Dissertation Award from IEEE RTSS
The research team lead by Professor Shin In Shik (Department of Computer Science) received the Excellent Dissertation Awardy in the IEEE RTSS out of 157 dissertations.
It is the first time a Professor under an institute in the Asia region received the Award in the RTSS field during its 33 year history.
Professor Shin had already received an Excellent Dissertation Award as a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Pennsylvania. Thus Professor Shin became the first and only scientist to receive the Award twice.
Professor Shin has successfully defined the scheduling method of the multicore processor which was regarded as the problem in the field of RTSS for the past decade.
Professor Shin has suggested new criteria for sorting real time tasks in parallel thereby suggesting a new scheduling method that surpasses current scheduling methods. The results are anticipated to provide new perspectives in the field of RTSS using multicore processors.
2013.01.22 View 8763
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Professor Lee Jeong Yong Receives 2012 'KAISTian of the Year' Award
Professor Lee Jeong Yong (Department of Material Science and Engineering) received the 2012 ‘KAISTian of the Year’ Award.
Professor Lee had successfully developed a technique that allowed the observation and analysis of liquid in atomic scale.
The technique is expected to have great impact on nano-material synthesis in solution, explaining electrode and electrolyte reaction, liquid and catalysis reaction research, and etc. and was therefore named as the best experimental accomplishment in KAIST in 2012.
Professor Lee and his team’s finding has been published in the April edition of Science magazine and has had attracted the attention of the world. In addition, BBC News, and Science & Environment reported on the findings as their respective top articles.
The optical microscope is incapable of atomic scale observation and the electron microscopes are capable but because of the vacuum state all liquids undergo evaporation making it impossible to observe liquids in an atomic scale.
Professor Lee’s team wrapped the liquid with a layer of grapheme to prevent evaporation and successfully observed real time the platinum growth process in solution.
Professor Lee’s findings were introduced as an example of exemplar research case in the Presidential address for ‘Science Day’ in April.
2013.01.22 View 9630
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Professor Hwang Kyu Young and Professor Yang Dong Yeol Receives Engineer of Korea Award
Emeritus Professor Hwang Kyu Young (Department of Computer Sciences) and Professor Yang Dong Yeol (Department of Mechanical Engineering) were named as the 2012 Engineer of Korea by the Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology and Korea Science Foundation.
The Engineer of Korea Award is awarded biannually to scientists and engineers that have contributed to the development of Korea’s science and technology and national economy.
Professor Hwang’s work with DBMS and close coupling architecture of information search and overall new theories and application technology development in the field of database system has aided the opening and expansion of IT software industry development and the advent of internet information culture era.
Professor Yang is a word renowned scholar in the field of net shape manufacturing and is considered to have opened a new page in the field of nano-molding technique.
In addition, Professor Eum Sang Il (Department of Mathematical Science) has been selected as the 2012 Young Scientist Award.
2013.01.22 View 12098
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KAIST Professors win 2012 Korea Engineering Award
Distinguished Professor Hwang Gyu Young (Department of Computer Science) and Professor Yang Dong Yol (Department of Mechanical Engineering) from KAIST received the 2012 ‘Korea Engineering Award’ hosted by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology and the Korea Research Foundation.
The ‘Korea Engineering Award’ is given biennially to researchers who have accomplished world class research and have contributed greatly to Korea’s development in the field of Science and Technology. The award started in 1994 and a total of 24 recipients were recognized in various fields such as electronics, mechanics, chemistry, construction, etc. The recipients of the award areawarded the Presidential award as well as 50million won as prize money.
Professor Hwang was recognized for his research on DBMS close-coupling architecture as well as other new data base system theories, contributing to the development of the IT software industry in Korea. Professor Yang was praised for his work in precision shape creation and manufacturing, especially for his work in the nano-stereolithography process.
In addition, Professor Oum Sang-il from the Deparment of Mathematical Science received the 2012 ‘Young Scientist Award’ hosted by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology and the Korean Academy of Science and Technology.
The ceremony for ‘Korea Engineering Award’ and the ‘Young Scientist Award’ was held in Seoul Press Center Press Club on the 21st of December.
2012.12.26 View 13778 -
Professor Cho Young-ho wins 'E2 Star' award
Professor Cho Young-ho from the Department of Bio and Brain Engineering at KAIST was chosen as the ‘E2 Star’ at the ‘2012 Engineering Education Festa’ in academics. The ‘2012 Engineering Education Festa’ hosted by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology was held to display outstanding research results and to conceptualize the future of science education.
The ‘E2 star’ award is given to renowned figures in industry, academia and society. A total of 35 candidates were recommended for the 3 fields and Professor Cho received the first place in the online voting.
Professor Cho received high marks for his work in engineering education, research development and increasing the communication between academia and industry, as well as the commercialization of science and technology. Professor Cho was especially praised for the specialization of engineering education in integrated fields and the joint research with US and Swiss universities.
Professor Cho Young-ho(Department of Bio and Brain Engineering, KAIST)
2012.12.26 View 11034 -
High Efficiency Bio-butanol production technology developed
KAIST and Korean Company cooperative research team has developed the technology that increases the productivity of bio-butanol to equal that of bio-ethanol and decreases the cost of production.
Professor Lee Sang Yeop (Department of Biological-Chemical Engineering) collaborated with GS Caltex and BioFuelChem Ltd. to develop a bio-butanol production process using the system metabolism engineering method that increased the productivity and decreased the production cost.
Bio-butanol is being widely regarded as the environmentally friendly next generation energy source that surpasses bio-ethanol.
The energy density of bio-butanol is 29.9MJ (mega Joule) per Liter, 48% larger than bio-ethanol (19.6MJ) and comparable to gasoline (32MJ). Bio-butanol is advantageous in that it can be processed from inedible biomass and is therefore unrelated to food crises.
Especially because bio-butanol shows similar characteristics especially in its octane rating, enthalpy of vaporization, and air-fuel ratio, it can be used in a gasoline engine.
However barriers such as difficulty in gene manipulation of producer bacterium and insufficient information prevented the mass production of bio-butanol.
Professor Lee’s team applied the system metabolism engineering method that he had invented to shift the focus to the production pathway of bio-butanol and made a new metabolism model.
In the new model the bio-butanol production pathway is divided into the hot channel and the cold channel.
The research team focused on improving the efficiency of the hot channel and succeeded in improving the product yield of 49% (compared to theoretical yield) to 87%.
The team furthered their research and developed a live bio-butanol collection and removal system with GS Caltex. The collaboration succeeded in producing 585g of butanol using 1.8kg of glucose at a rate of 1.3g per hour, boasting world’s highest concentration, productivity, and rate and improving productivity of fermentation by three fold and decreasing costs by 30%.
The result of the research was published in world renowned ‘mBio’ microbiology journal.
2012.12.21 View 9478
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Professor Hwang Gyu Young Elected as Chairman of IEEE TCDE.
Professor Hwang Gyu Young (Department of Computer Science) was elected as the Chairman of IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) TCDE (Technical Committee on Data Engineering).
IEEE TCDE is one of the three academic organizations (including VLDB Endowment, ACM SIGMOD) and Professor Hwang is the first to be elected as Chairman from the Asia-Pacific region.
Professor Hwang’s tenure begins on New Year’s Day for two years.
IEEE TCDE holds the world’s most prestigious academic competition IEEE ICDE and hosts the Working Group and publishes the IEEE Data Engineering Bulletin.
2012.12.21 View 10015
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Firefly inspired high efficiency LED technology developed
A firefly inspired, high efficiency self-illuminating LED has been developed.
Professor Jeong Gi Hoon (Department of Bio and Brain Engineering) mimicked the nanostructure of the external layer of the illumination organ of a firefly and succeeded in fabricating high illumination efficiency LED lenses.
Conventional lenses required expensive anti-reflection coating. The developed lenses utilize the bio-inspired nanostructure on the surface of the lenses themselves to reduce the reflectivity of the lenses thereby decreasing production costs.
The developed antireflection nanostructure is expected to be applied to various digital devices and lighting fixtures.
Antireflective structures have been applied in various fields in order to enhance light efficiency However these structures have been limited to flat surfaces and therefore was difficult to implement to curved surfaces like LED lenses.
Professor Jeong’s team solved this problem by using three dimensional micro molding processes.
The team fabricated the nanostructure by forming a single nanoparticle layer on the silicon oxide and performing dry etching. On this nanostructure PDMS was poured and manipulated to fabricate a lens structure similar to that of a firefly.
The fabricated lens showed similar efficiency as conventional antireflection coating.
2012.11.29 View 8961