KIST Holds 57th Anniversay Opening Ceremony

On February 10th, the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST; President: Seok-Jin Yoon) held a ceremony at its headquarters in Seongbuk-gu, Seoul to mark its 57th anniversary. The opening ceremony for this year was a colorful and in-depth event, featuring an "Animatronics Robot Ray" performance put together by Dr. Se-Hyuk Yim's team at KIST’s AI and Robotics Institute and a carbon neutrality seminar for diplomatic mission members.

At the award ceremony for the KIST Grand Prize, which is awarded to the best researchers of the month, Byoung-Koun Min, Director of the Clean Energy Research Division, and Hyung-Suk Oh, a principal researcher for the Division, were honored for the development and transfer of a technology to convert CO2 into ethylene. Meanwhile, Dong-Won Chun, a principal researcher for the Energy Materials Research Center, and his research team were also recognized as joint recipients of the KIST Grand Prize for their work related to publishing a paper in Nature on developing and identifying the formation mechanism for palladium hydride.

For the Songgok Science and Technology Award, organized by the donation fund of the first President of KIST, Dr. Hyung-Sup Choi, Professor Tae-Il Kim of Sungkyunkwan University's School of Chemical Engineering was selected for his work with implementing an ultra-sensitive sensor that simulates the vibration sensor of a spider, published in Nature.

Following the awards ceremony, a KIST Future Foundation donation agreement ceremony was held with six of the 110 contractors who pledged to support the Foundation present, including former KIST President Kil-Choo Moon and principal researcher Uh-Taek Oh. Since its launch in March 2022 as the first public-interest foundation, the KIST Future Foundation has been carrying out researcher development and science and engineering scholarship projects, social contribution projects, and ODA projects.

In the afternoon, a seminar for diplomatic missions was held under the theme of carbon neutrality. The seminar was attended by embassy representatives from 50 countries, including the EU, as well as representatives from two international organizations and five government-funded research institutes in Korea. The topics at the seminar included the current status of KIST’s international cooperation efforts, including the VKIST establishment support project, and presentations and a discussion session on the status of carbon neutrality in KIST, Germany, Sweden, the UK, and Italy.

In his opening remarks, the President of KIST, Dr. Seok-Jin Yoon, commented, "It is time for Korea, the only country to have successfully risen from developing country to join the ranks of advanced countries, to pave the way for creating a new science and technology strategy," and added, "We hope that all of the members of KIST work together to achieve true innovation, so that KIST can become a tower that lights the way for the country's future with science and technology."

Since its opening 57 years ago, in 1966, KIST has been focusing on research for the development of Korea’s national S&T, and has been driving S&T development through efforts such as national industrialization think tanks, advanced technology research, and leading fundamental technology research.