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KAIST Develops Core Technology to Synthesize a Helical Nanostructure
Professor Dong-Ki Yoon’s research team of the Graduate School of Nanoscience and Technology (GSNT) at KAIST has developed helical nanostructures using self-assembly processes. The results were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America(PNAS) on the October 7th.
This technology enables the synthesis of various helical structures on a relatively large confined area. Its synthesis is often considered the most arduous for three dimensional structures. Formed from liquid crystal, the structure holds a regular helical structure within the confined space of 20 to 300 nanometers. Also, the distance between each pattern increased as the diameter of the nanostructure increased.
Liquid crystals have a unique property of responding sensitively to the surrounding electromagnetic field. The technology, in combination with the electromagnetic property of liquid crystal, is expected to foster the development of highly efficient optoelectronic devices.
Using this technology, it is possible to develop three dimensional patterning technology beyond the current semiconductor manufacturing technology which uses two dimensional photolithography processes. Three-dimensional semiconductor devices are expected to store hundred times more data than current devices. They will also lower costs by simplifying manufacturing processes.
The essence of this research, “self-assembly in confined space,” refers to controlling complex nanostructures, which can be synthesized from materials such as macromolecules, liquid crystal molecules, and biomolecules in relation to surrounding environments including the temperature, concentration, and pH.
The research team produced a confined space with a length of tens of nanometers by using a porous anodized aluminum membrane induced from an electrochemical reaction. They successfully synthesized independently controlled helical nanostructures by forming the helical structures from liquid crystal molecules within that space.
Professor Yoon said, “This research examines the physicochemical principle of controlling helical nanostructures.” He highlighted the significance of the research and commented, “The technology enables the control of complex nanostructures from organic molecules by using confined space and surface reforming.”
He added that, “When grafted with nanotechnology or information technology, this technology will spur new growth to liquid crystal-related industries such as the LCD.”
The research was led by two Ph.D. candidates, Hanim Kim and Sunhee Lee, under the guidance of Professor Yoon. Dr. Tae-Joo Shin of the Pohang Accelerator Laboratory, Professor Sang-Bok Lee of the University of Maryland, and Professor Noel Clark of the University of Colorado also participated.
Picture 1. Electron Microscopy Pictures and Conceptual Diagrams of Helical Nanostructures
Picture 2. Electron Microscopy Pictures of Manufactured Helical Nanostructures
2014.10.29 View 9706 -
Parents of Alumni Donates to KAIST
Parents of KAIST alumni donated a scholarship of USD 4,800 to the university. A donation ceremony took place at the president’s office on October 21, 2014.
Two sons and the daughter-in-law of Ki-Hong Oh (husband) and Soon-Yi Kim (wife) studied at KAIST. Hwan-Hee Oh and Hwan-Yup Oh graduated with Master’s degrees in Mechanical Engineering in 2005 and 2009, respectively. Jung-Im Min received a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering in 2005.
Oh and Kim, who are orange growers in Jeju Island, Korea, said, “We have always appreciated the generous support our children received from KAIST and thought for many years about ways to make a contribution to the development of the university. Although this is a small amount, we are pleased to express our appreciation to KAIST.”
The couple hope that their donation will inspire others in Korea to follow suit and added, “Just like many of the great universities in the west which are supported through donations made by their alumni and people from all walks of life, we would like to see Korean universities also benefit from such a culture and practice.”
President Steve Kang expressed his gratitude to the couple and said, “KAIST will cherish your philanthropic good deeds, and the scholarship will be used to support students as you wish.”
2014.10.22 View 9449 -
KAIST and Samsung Heavy Industries Celebrate 20 Years of Cooperation
KAIST and Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) celebrated the twentieth anniversary of their university-industry cooperation in shipbuilding and ocean technology research. Established in 1995, the cooperation has remained steadfast for two decades, even times when Korea suffered gravely from its financial crisis in late 1990s.
A ceremony to commemorate the cooperation took place at the Mechanical Engineering Building on October 17, 2014. About thirty distinguished guests including the Head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Professor Choong-Sik Bae, and the chief engineer of SHI Marine Research Institute, Dr. Jong-Soo Seo, participated in the ceremony.
The cooperation programs included appointing advisory professors for technological support, implementing business-based academic courses, offering university-industry wide open lectures, opening regular courses for auditing, and finding possible joint researches. Through this cooperation, Samsung has secured technologies needed for industry, and KAIST has produced students who have real-world experience in industrial fields.
Twenty years of cooperation has produced shining results by running various programs such as technological advice, special lectures, small-scale research projects, consignment research projects, and courses for research and design personnel.
For example, what started as a small-scale research project with USD 4,800 in funding, the LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) related research has grown into a large-scale research project with a total of USD 2.85 million in funding. As a result, they developed a secondary barrier for LNG carriers which was recognized by Lloyd‘s Register. Their research eventually lowered ship manufacturing costs tremendously.
In 2003, the cooperation project received the presidential citation from the University-Industry Cooperation Competition organized by the Federation of Korean Industries.
KAIST and SHI planned to increase their cooperation to make it Korea’s leading university-industry cooperation program.
Professor Bae said, “Our programs to focus on solving industrial problems have turned out quite successful.” He emphasized that “for this reason, the cooperation even continued during the Asian financial crisis in 1997.”
He added, “By expanding the current cooperation, we aim to make it an exemplary program that contributes to Korea’s shipbuilding and ocean plant industries.”
2014.10.21 View 10731 -
Wuhan University, China, Appoints Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee as Honorary Professor
Sang Yup Lee, Distinguished Professor of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at KAIST, has been appointed an honorary professor at Wuhan University in Hubei Province, China. This is the third time that Professor Lee has received an honorary professorship from Chinese academic institutions. The Chinese Academy of Sciences appointed him an honorary professor in 2012, and Shanghai Jia Tong University asked him to serve as an advisory professor in 2013, respectively.
Professor Lee was recognized for his pioneering research in systems metabolic engineering of microorganisms necessary for the development of green chemical industries. He succeeded in producing succinic acid through bacterial fermentation and engineering plastic raw materials in the most effective and economical method for the first time in the world. Professor Lee also developed polylactic acid, a bio-based polymer that allows plastics to be produced through natural and renewable resources, as well as the microbial production of alkanes, an alternative to gasoline that can be produced from fatty acids.
Professor Lee has been actively working as a member of a group of global leaders supported by the World Economic Forum (WEF), serving the Chairman of the Future of Chemicals, Advanced Materials & Biotechnology, Global Agenda Councils, WEF.
Wuhan University is a comprehensive and key national university selected by the Chinese government as a major recipient of state funding for research. It is also known as one of the most beautiful campuses in China.
2014.10.20 View 10441 -
KAIST Registers an Internationally Recognized Standard Patent
A video compression technology, jointly developed by Professor Mun-Chul Kim of the Department of Electrical Engineering at KAIST, the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), and the Korean Broadcasting System (KBS), is registered internationally as the standard patent in the next-generation High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC).
HEVC (H.265) is an international technology standard that compresses large image data for Ultra High Definition (UHD) televisions and smartphones. It has the twice the compression efficiency as that of H.264/AVC which is most commonly used for processing full HD sources. This means that it is able to compress a video file to half the size while maintaining the same image quality.
Although the related market is at a nascent stage, HEVC technology has already been applied to the latest version of televisions and smartphones. Experts predict that the market will grow to USD 200 billion by 2016, and KAIST is expected to receive a royalty payment of USD 9.3 million from this patent.
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO/IEC) established the HEVC standard in January 2013. Also, an international patent pool licensing corporation, MPEG LA announced the HEVC standard patent pool on September 29, 2014.
Professor Joongmyeon Bae, Dean of the Office of University-Industry Cooperation (OUIC) of KAIST, said, “This is an unprecedented case for Korea whereby a core technology developed by a university became an international standard, which has a vast impact on the market.”
President of KAIST, Steve Kang commented, “With its advanced technology, KAIST joined the HEVC standard patent pool as one of the 23 founding members along with Apple, Siemens, and NEC. This is a remarkable achievement.”
Picture 1: Improvements in video compression technology
Picture 2: Comparison of different screen resolutions
2014.10.09 View 14002 -
KAIST Ranks 26th in Engineering & Technology and 52nd overall in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2014-2015
The 2014-2015 Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings were released on October 1, 2014. KAIST took 52nd place in the overall rankings and 26th in the field of engineering and technology.
THE used 13 performance indicators to evaluate universities, grouping them into five areas of teaching, research, citations, industry income, and international outlook.
In recent years, KAIST has seen steady improvements in areas of research, citations, and international outlook. In addition to KAIST, two Korean universities, Seoul National University (50th) and Pohang University of Science and Technology (66th), were included within the top 100 universities.
For details, please visit:
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2014-15/world-ranking.
2014.10.03 View 9257 -
KAIST Co-owns the HEVC Patent Portfolio License
MPEG LA, LLC, a firm based in Denver, Colorado, which licenses patent pools covering essential patents required for the use of video coding technology, such as MPEG-2, MPEG-4 Visual (Part 2), and HEVC/H.264, announced the availability of the High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) Patent Portfolio License on September 29, 2014.
The HEVC standard, also known as H.265 and MPEG-H Part 2, is necessary to improve video coding and transmission efficiency for the Internet, televisions, and mobile gadgets with increased speed and capacity.
Through the portfolio license, users can easily obtain patent rights required for the HEVC standard in a single transaction, instead of negotiating separate licenses from multiple patent holders.
A total of 23 enterprises currently own essential HEVC patents. KAIST is the only Korean university among the joint patent owners. Collaborating with the Korea Broadcasting System (KBS) and the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), Professor Mun-Chul Kim of the Electrical Engineering Department at KAIST developed one of the core patents.
For a link to a press release distributed by MPEG LA, LLC, please see:
MPEG LA, LLC, September 29, 2014
"MPEG LA, LLC Offers HEVC Patent Portfolio License"
http://www.mpegla.com/main/Pages/Media.aspx
2014.10.02 View 14473 -
KAIST and the National Assembly of Korea Create a Committee to Plan "Patent Hub Korea"
The KAIST Graduate School of Future Strategy (GSFS) and the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea held a meeting at the National Assembly building in Seoul on September 23, 2014.
At the meeting, the two organizations agreed to create a planning committee that will work for the construction of Korea as a global patent hub. In addition, the two also reviewed national laws and regulations related to patents and intellectual property rights (IPR) and discussed a future action agenda.
Dean Kwang-Hyung Lee of GSFS, Chairman Ui-Hwa Chung of the National Assembly, Chairman Jong-Yong Yoon of the Presidential Council on Intellectual Property, and many representatives from the academia, government, and law participated in the meeting.
Dean Lee, who is the co-chairman of the planning committee, said:
“Although Korea has globally ranked number five in patents and IPR, it still suffers from the lack of relevant legal systems and professionals. I hope that the planning committee will serve as a catalyst to make Korea stronger in the field of intellectual property and to accelerate the creation of the Patent Hub Korea.”
2014.09.24 View 8550 -
Ultra-high Resolution 2-dimentional Real-time Image Capture with Super Lens
Ultra-high Resolution 2-dimentional Real-time Image Capture with Super Lens
Applications to high-precision semiconductor processing or intracellular structures observation are possible.
A joint research team led by Professors Yongkeun Park and Yong-Hoon Cho from the Department of Physics, KAIST, has succeeded in capturing real-time 2D images at a resolution of 100 nm (nanometers), which was impossible with optical lens due to the diffraction limit of light until now. Its future application includes high-precision semiconductor manufacturing process or observation of intracellular structures.
This research follows the past research of the super-lens developed by Professor Park last April, using paint spray to observe images that have three times higher resolution than those discovered by conventional optical lens.
Since optical lens utilize the refraction of light, the diffraction limit, which prevents achieving focus smaller than the wavelength of light, has always been a barrier for acquiring high-resolution images. In the past, it was impossible to observe objects less than the size of 200 to 300 nm in the visible light spectrum.
In order to solve the problem of near-field extinction due to scattering of light, the research team used spray paint consisting of nano-particles massed with dense scattering materials to obtain high-resolution information.
Then, by calculating and restoring the first scattering shape of light using the time reversibility of light, the researchers were able to overcome the diffraction limit. The original position of an object to be observed is obtained by deriving the complex trajectory of the light, and reversing the time to locate the particular position of the object.
Professor Park said, “This new technology can be used as the core technology in all fields which require optical measurement and control. The existing electron microscopy cannot observe cells without destroying them, but the new technology allows us to visualize at ultra-high resolution without destruction.”
The research results were published online in the 9th edition of Physical Review Letters, a prestigious international journal in the field of physics.
2014.09.23 View 11034 -
PIBOT, a small humanoid robot flies an aircraft
The 2014 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2014) took place in Chicago, Illinois, on September 14-18, 2014.
Professor David Hyunchul Shim and his students from the Department of Aerospace Engineering, KAIST, presented a research paper entitled “A Robot-machine Interface for Full-functionality Automation Using a Humanoid” at the conference.
The robot called “PIBOT,” a pint-sized, tiny humanoid robot, uses a mixture of flight data and visuals to fly an airplane, capable of identifying and operating all of the buttons and switches in the cockpit of a normal light aircraft designed for humans.
For now, the robot is only flying a simulator, but Professor Shim expects that “PIBOT will help us have a fully automated flight experience, eventually replacing human pilots.”
The IEEE Spectrum magazine published an article on PIBOT posted online September 18, 2014. Please follow the link below for the article:
IEEE Spectrum, September 18, 2014
Tiny Humanoid Robot Learning to Fly Real Airplanes
http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/humanoids/tiny-humanoid-robot-learning-to-fly-real-airplanes
2014.09.23 View 14822 -
Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee Gives Special Lecture at Tianjin University, China
Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee from the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at KAIST gave a special lecture at Tianjin University, China, on September 12, 2014.
The university has invited prestigious scholars and scientists including Nobel Prize laureates from all around the world to their program called the "BeiYang Lecture Series."
Professor Lee said:
"The lecture series has invited many eminent global leaders such as Dr. Steven Chu, who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997 and also served the 12th United States Secretary of Energy. It is a great honor to participate in the program as a speaker. The university told me that in recognition of my research in the development of sustainable biochemical industry through systems metabolic engineering, I was invited to speak.”
Professor Lee presented his speech entitled “Production of Chemical Materials through Microorganism Metabolic Systems Engineering” and took questions from the audience.
Professor Lee developed the world’s most efficient microorganism and bioprocess such as succinate, butanol, and engineering plastic raw materials. In recent years, he has succeeded in producing a small quantity of gasoline through converting in-vivo generated fatty acids.
2014.09.16 View 10324 -
Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee Participates in the 2014 Summer Davos Forum
Distinguished Professor Sang Yup Lee from the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, KAIST, was invited to lead four sessions at the Annual Meeting 2014, the World Economic Forum, also known as the Summer Davos Forum, which was held in Tianjin, China, from September 10th to 12th.
Two of the four sessions Professor Lee participated in were held on September 10th. At the first session entitled “Biotechnology Ecosystem,” he examined with other panelists the future of bioengineering in depth and discussed major policies and industry trends that will be necessary for the development of future biotechnologies.
Professor Lee later attended the “Strategic Shifts in Healthcare” session as a moderator. Issues related to transforming the health industry such as the next-generation genomics, mobile health and telemedicine, and wearable devices and predictive analytics were addressed.
On September 12, Professor Lee joined the “IdeasLab with KAIST” and gave a presentation on nanotechnology. There was a total of ten IdeasLab sessions held at the Summer Davos Forum, and KAIST was the only Korean university ever invited to host this session. In addition to Professor Lee’s presentation, three more presentations were made by KAIST professors on such topics as “Sustainable Energy and Materials” and “Next-generation Semiconductors.”
Lastly, Professor Lee participated in the “Global Promising Technology” session with the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council members. At this session, he explained the selection of the “World’s Top 10 Most Promising Technologies” and “Bio Sector’s Top 10 Technologies” and led discussions about the “2015 Top 10 Technologies” with the council members.
The Davos Forum has been announcing the “World’s Top 10 Most Promising Technologies” since 2012, and Professor Lee has played a key role in the selection while working as the Chairman of Global Agenda Council. The selection results are presented at the Davos Forum every year and have attracted a lot of attention from around the world.
2014.09.15 View 13386