%46%6f%63%75%73
-
Semiconductor Leadership Spotlighted in Nature Sister Journal
<(From Left) Prof. Shinhyun Choi, Prof. Young Gyu Yoon, Prof.Seunghyub Yoo from the School of Electrical Engineering, Prof. Kyung Min Kim from Materials Science and Engineering>
KAIST (President Kwang Hyung Lee) announced on the 5th of September that its semiconductor research and education achievements were highlighted on August 18 in Nature Reviews Electrical Engineering, a sister journal of the world-renowned scientific journal Nature.
Title: Semiconductor-related research and education at KAIST DOI: 10.1038/s44287-025-00204-3
This special "Focus" article provides a detailed look at KAIST's leadership in next-generation semiconductor research, talent development, and global industry-academia collaboration, presenting a future blueprint for Korea's semiconductor industry. Editor Silvia Conti personally conducted the interviews, with KAIST professors including Kyung Min Kim from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and Young Gyu Yoon, Shinhyun Choi, Sung-Yool Choi, and Seunghyub Yoo from the School of Electrical Engineering, participating.
KAIST operates educational programs such as the School of Electrical Engineering, the Department of Semiconductor Systems Engineering, and the Graduate School of Semiconductor Engineering. It is leading next-generation semiconductor research in areas like neuromorphic computing, in-memory computing, and 2D new material-based devices. Building on this foundation, researchers are developing new architectures and devices that transcend the limitations of existing silicon, driving innovation in various application fields such as artificial intelligence, robotics, and medicine.
Notably, research on implementing biological functions like synapses and neurons into hardware platforms using new types of memory such as RRAM and PRAM is gaining international attention. This work opens up possibilities for applications in robots, edge computing, and on-sensor AI systems.
Furthermore, KAIST has operated EPSS (Samsung Advanced Human Resources Training Program) and KEPSI (SK Hynix Semiconductor Advanced Human Resources Training Program) based on long-standing partnerships with Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix. Graduate students in these programs receive full scholarships and are guaranteed employment after graduation. The Department of Semiconductor Systems Engineering, newly established in 2022, selects 100 undergraduate students each year to provide systematic education. Additionally, the KAIST–Samsung Electronics Industry-Academia Cooperation Center, which involves more than 70 labs annually, serves as a long-term hub for joint industry-academia research, contributing to solving critical issues within the industry.
The article emphasizes KAIST's growth beyond a simple research institution into an international research hub. KAIST is enhancing diversity and inclusivity by expanding the hiring of female faculty and establishing a Global Talent Visa Center to support foreign professors and students, attracting outstanding talent from around the world. As a core university within the Daedeok Research Complex (Daedeok Innopolis), it serves as the heart of "Korea's Silicon Valley."
KAIST researchers predict that the future of semiconductor technology is not in simple device miniaturization but in a convergent approach involving neuromorphic technology, 3D packaging technology, and AI applications. This article shows that KAIST's strategic research direction and leadership are gaining attention from both the global academic and industrial communities.
Professor Kyung Min Kim stated, "I am very pleased that KAIST's next-generation semiconductor research and talent development strategy has been widely publicized to domestic and international academia and industry through this article, and we will continue to contribute to the development of future semiconductor technology with innovative convergence research."
KAIST President Kwang Hyung Lee remarked, "Being highlighted for our semiconductor research and education achievements in a world-renowned science journal is a testament to the dedication and pioneering spirit of our university members. I am delighted that KAIST's growth as a global research hub is gaining recognition, and we will continue to expand industry-academia collaboration to lead next-generation semiconductor innovation and play a key role in helping Korea become a future semiconductor powerhouse."
2025.09.05 View 5408 -
KAIST researchers develops a tech to enable production of ultrahigh-resolution LED with sub-micrometer scale pixels
Ultrahigh-resolution displays are an essential element for developing next-generation electronic products such as virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and smart watches, and can be applied not only to head-mounted displays, but also to smart glasses and smart lenses. The technology developed through this research is expected to be used to make such next-generation ultrahigh-resolution displays and other various sub-micro optoelectronic devices.
KAIST (President Kwang Hyung Lee) announced on the 22nd that Professor Yong-Hoon Cho's research team of KAIST Department of Physics developed the core technology for an ultrahigh resolution light-emitting diode (LED) display that can realize 0.5 micron-scale pixels smaller than 1/100 of the average hair thickness (about 100 microns) using focused ion beams.
Commonly, pixelation of ultrahigh-resolution LED displays usually relies on the etching method that physically cuts the area around the pixel, but as the pixel becomes smaller due to the occurrence of various defects around it, leading to side-effects of having leakage of current increased and light-emission efficiency decreased. In addition, various complex processes such as patterning for pixelation and post-processing for prevention of leakage current are required.
Professor Yong-Hoon Cho's research team developed a technology that can create pixels down to the size of a microscale without the complicated pre- and post-processing using a focused ion beam. This method has the advantage of being able to freely set the shape of the emitting pixel without causing any structural deformation on the material surface by controlling the intensity of the focused ion beam.
The focused ion beam technology has been widely used for ultrahigh-magnification imaging and nanostructure fabrication in fields such as materials engineering and biology. However, when a focused ion beam is used on a light emitting body such as an LED, light emission of a portion hit by the beam and a surrounding area rapidly decreases, which has been a barrier to fabricating a nano-scale light emitting structure. Upon facing this issue, Professor Cho's research team began the research on the idea that if they turned things around to use these problematic phenomena, they can be used in ultra-fine pixelation method on a sub-micron scale.
The research team used a focused ion beam whose intensity was softened to the extent that the surface was not shaved, and found that not only the light-emission rapidly decreased in the area hit by the focused ion beam, but also the local resistance greatly increased. As a result, while the surface of the LED is kept flat, the portion hit by the focused ion beam is optically and electrically isolated, enabling pixelation for independent operation.
Professor Yong-Hoon Cho, who led the research, said, “We have newly developed a technology that can create sub-micron-scale pixels without complicated processes using a focused ion beam, which will be a base technology that can be applied to next-generation ultrahigh-resolution displays and nano-photoelectronic devices.”
This research in which the Master's student Ji-Hwan Moon and the Ph.D. student Baul Kim of KAIST Department of Physics participated as co-first authors, was carried out with the support of the National Research Foundation of Korea's Support Program for Mid-Career Researchers and the Institute of Information and Communications Technology Planning and Evaluation. It was published online in 'Advanced Materials' on February 13, and was also selected as the internal cover of the next offline edition. (Title: Electrically Driven Sub-Micron Light-Emitting Diode Arrays Using Maskless and Etching-Free Pixelation)
Figure 1. Schematic diagram of the technology for ultrahigh density sub-micron-sized pixels through He focused ion beam (FIB) irradiation on an LED device
Figure 2. Ultra-high-density pixelation technology of micro light-emitting diodes (μLED) through He focused ion beam (FIB) irradiation
Figure 3. Rectangular pixels of different sizes (surface structure picture and luminescence picture) realized by a focused ion beam. Luminescence pictures of pixel arrays ranging in size from 20 µm x 20 µm to 0.5 µm x 0.5 µm, with surface flatness maintained.
2023.03.08 View 13282 -
KAIST and Google Partner to Develop AI Curriculum
Two KAIST professors, Hyun Wook Ka from the School of Transdisciplinary Studies and Young Jae Jang from the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, were recipients of Google Education Grants that will support the development of new AI courses integrating the latest industrial technology. This collaboration is part of the KAIST-Google Partnership, which was established in July 2019 with the goal of nurturing AI talent at KAIST.
The two proposals -- Professor Ka’s ‘Cloud AI-Empowered Multimodal Data Analysis for Human Affect Detection and Recognition’ and Professor Jang’s ‘Learning Smart Factory with AI’-- were selected by the KAIST Graduate School of AI through a school-wide competition held in July. The proposals then went through a final review by Google and were accepted. The two professors will receive $7,500 each for developing AI courses using Google technology for one year.
Professor Ka’s curriculum aims to provide a rich learning experience for students by providing basic knowledge on data science and AI and helping them obtain better problem solving and application skills using practical and interdisciplinary data science and AI technology.
Professor Jang’s curriculum is designed to solve real-world manufacturing problems using AI and it will be field-oriented. Professor Jang has been managing three industry-academic collaboration centers in manufacturing and smart factories within KAIST and plans to develop his courses to go beyond theory and be centered on case studies for solving real-world manufacturing problems using AI.
Professor Jang said, “Data is at the core of smart factories and AI education, but there is often not enough of it for the education to be effective. The KAIST Advanced Manufacturing Laboratory has a testbed for directly acquiring data generated from real semiconductor automation equipment, analyzing it, and applying algorithms, which enables truly effective smart factory and AI education.”
KAIST signed a partnership with Google in July 2019 to foster global AI talent and is operating various programs to train AI experts and support excellent AI research for two years.
The Google AI Focused Research Award supports world-class faculty performing cutting-edge research and was previously awarded to professors Sung Ju Hwang from the Graduate School of AI and Steven Whang from the School of Electrical Engineering along with Google Cloud Platform (GCP) credits. These two professors have been collaborating with Google teams since October 2018 and recently extended their projects to continue through 2021.
In addition, a Google Ph.D. Fellowship was awarded to Taesik Gong from the School of Computing in October this year, and three Student Travel Grants were awarded to Sejun Park from the School of Electrical Engineering, Chulhyung Lee from the Department of Mathematical Sciences, and Sangyun Lee from the School of Computing earlier in March. Five students were also recommended for the Google Internship program in March.
(END)
2020.12.11 View 20726 -
KAIST-Google Partnership for AI Education and Research
Google has agreed to support KAIST students and professors in the fields of AI research and education. President Sung-Chul Shin and Google Korea Country Director John Lee signed the collaboration agreement during a ceremony on July 19 at KAIST.
Under the agreement, Google will fund the Google AI-Focused Research Awards Program, the PhD Fellowship Program, and Student Travel Grants for KAIST. In addition, Google will continue to provide more academic and career building opportunities for students, including Google internship programs.
KAIST and Google has been collaborating for years. Professor Steven Whang at the School of Electrical Engineering and Professor Sung Ju Hwang at the School of Computing won the AI-Focused Award in 2018 and conduct their researches on "Improving Generalization and Reliability of Any Deep Neural Networks" and "Automatic and Acitionable Model Analysis for TFX," respectively. Outstanding PhD students have been recognized through the PhD Fellowship Program. However, this new collaboration agreement will focus on research, academic development, and technological innovation in AI.
Google plans to support research in the fields of deep learning, cloud machine learning, and voice technologies. Google will fund the development of two educational programs based on Google open source technology each year for two years that will be used in the new AI Graduate School opening for the fall semester.
John Lee of Google Korea said, “This partnership lays a solid foundation for deeper collaboration.” President Shin added, “This partnership will not only advance Korea’s global competitiveness in AI-powered industries but also contribute to the global community by nurturing talents in this most extensive discipline.”
2019.07.22 View 14474 -
Attosecond pulses measure ultrafast photoionization processes by Laser Focus World, April 12, 2012
Laser Focus World, a monthly magazine published since 1965 that covers news and business developments on laser, photonics, and optoelectronics technologies, applications, and markets, released a news article on the recent research result by Professor Chang-Hee Nam from the Department of Physics. For the article, please follow the link below:
http://www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/2012/04/kaist-attosecond
2012.04.13 View 9935 -
Education 3.0: Student Centered, Innovative Education
Education 3.0 is a teaching method development program aiming to raise the quality and efficiency of education through innovating the existing one-sided professor-student lecture approach.
Students will be able to study regardless of the time and space restrictions thanks to the IT-based curriculum, and will be able to conduct independent studies. Also, the lectures and contents will become internationalized through sharing them with other advanced universities. The lectures will take on an integrated format where students and professors will be discussing things together.
KAIST will be testing this program on the three courses of calculus, general chemistry, and freshmen design, and will further expand the use of this program.
Participants have been chosen from the freshmen this year, and 201 students have signed up for calculus and 163 for general chemistry, showing great enthusiasm on the new program. 48 students have been selected for each course out of the volunteers.
Class will take on both the form of an online and offline lecture.
Students must first log on to the KLMS(KAIST Learning Management System) and then review the lecture video, slides, multimedia, online lab, outside video resources, and other digital content prepared by the professors, and learn according to one’s own pace. Questions can be asked online, and assignments are also to be submitted online.
The offline lectures will take place at least once a week, and students are to discuss and question the material together and form groups to solve problems on their own. The professor and TAs are to interact with the students in the method seen as appropriate for the course.
For this Education 3.0 program, KAIST has installed a lecture system, video tracking system, A/V system, circular desks, glass boards, and other state-of-the-art facilities into a classroom in the Creative Learning Building. The KLMS(KAIST Learning Management System) which will serve as a learning platform has also been developed.
The reason why KAIST has been spending so much resources on education innovation has been that KAIST can not produce the talented personnel required by the future society with the current ‘one-way lecture’.
Tae-Eog Lee, the head of the Education 3.0 program said, “The current lecture method targeted for mass education can not created the leaders for the future society and companies. The lecture and education paradigm must shift in the science and engineering fields for the production of talented individuals with problem-solving abilities and creativity.”
He also stated, “The KAIST education 3.0 program is a student focused education method where the students who are the receivers of the education are the focus of the education, as well as a future-oriented method where the lectures are to become discussion-focused.”
While all the top notch universities are conducting education innovations, MIT has proposed an MITX program where it even gives students certificates for some classes just for listening to classes online and passing the test.
MIT is being evaluated as the leader of higher level education since through this everyone around the world will receive the chance to receive advanced education.
2012.04.04 View 11118
-
KAIST Wins First Prize at Recon Challenge of Int"l Magnetic Resonance Society
Professor Jong-chul Ye of the Department of Bio and Brain Engineering and Hong Jeong, a doctorate student, won the first prize at the Recon Challenge held as part of a workshop sponsored by the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine (ISMRM) held in Sedona, the United States.
The workshop took place under the theme of “data sampling and image reconstruction” on Jan. 25-28 in Sedona, Arizona, the United States. The KAIST team beat out major magnetic resonance imaging groups from the U.S. and Europe.
The Recon Challenge is a biennial competition highlighting different reconstruction strategies and metrics to compare them. ISMRM is an international, nonprofit, scientific association which promotes communication, research, development, and applications in the field of magnetic resonance in medicine and biology and other related topics.
At the competition, the KAIST team presented a new dynamic MRI algorithm called k-t FOCUSS that is optimal from a compressed sensing perspective. The main contribution of the method is extension of k-t FOCUSS to a more general framework with prediction and residual encoding. The prediction provides an initial estimate while the residual encoding takes care of the remaining residual signals.
2009.02.06 View 20387