Seoul National University's College of Engineering (Dean Kookheon Char) announced that Professor Sun Kim of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering (Academic Award) and Professor Jong-Ho Lee of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (Industry-University Cooperation Award) have been selected as the recipients of the Outstanding Engineering Professor Award of 2021. The awards ceremony was held on the May 26 at Seoul National University's Engineer House.
 
The Outstanding Engineering Professor Award was established in July 1992 with the funds contributed by the 15th alumni of the College of Engineering to promote research activities of engineering professors and advance industrial technology and from 2014 onwards it has been divided into three categories: the Education Award, the Academic Award, and the Industry-Academic Cooperation Award and a total of 71 professors have been awarded so far. The Education Award is given to a professor who has creatively and progressively devoted himself to education, the Academic Award to a professor with outstanding academic achievements and the Industry-University Cooperation Award to a professor who has made a significant contribution to the development of industrial technology from outstanding industrial-educational cooperation performance.
 
Professor Sun Kim of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, who won this year's academic award, joined the Department of Computer Science and Engineering in August 2011 and has greatly contributed to the development of talent and academic development through education and academic activities in the fields of bioinformatics and artificial intelligence. He has produced 14 masters, 13 doctoral and postdoctoral researchers and has served as the director of the Institute of Bioinformatics at Seoul National University since his appointment, showing world-class results in academic and educational aspects.
 
In addition, while conducting a number of national research projects, he has also published 92 academic papers in renowned domestic and foreign journals and the sum of the research results and the SCI paper Impact Factor so far is 337.218. In 2021, he received awards from a number of institutions, including being selected in the KOREA AWARDS 'Science Achievement Grand Prize' hosted by the World Press Association.
 
In 2017, while serving as the president of the Artificial Intelligence Society of the Korean Institute of Information Scientists and Engineers, he planned and held the first artificial intelligence-related academic conference (THE AI KOREA) in Korea, developing it into a leading artificial intelligence academic event in Korea. He contributed to improving domestic bioinformatics research to the world level by hosting international academic conferences such as GIW 2017, APBC 2020, and IEEE BIBM 2020 in Korea.
 
Professor Jong-Ho Lee of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, who won the Industry-Academic Cooperation Award, took office in September 2009 and conducted research and education in the semiconductor field, publishing 514 papers and registering 86 patents. In the past 10 years, he has published 20 papers at the top conferences in the field of semiconductor technology, the largest number in Korea and has contributed to the development of practical semiconductor technology and transferred a number of technologies, such as winning two excellent patent awards for industry-university research with related companies.
 
In addition, he invented a three-dimensional semiconductor device called Bulk-FinFET and led research in this field. This technology has contributed greatly to becoming a core device technology for advanced system semiconductors, which has become the standard for mass production of CPUs, APs, and GPUs. In particular, it achieved the highest technology fee in Korea by granting a patent license.
 
Further, he gave lectures at related companies multiple times to nurture manpower, served as the director of the semiconductor research institute and produced more than 4,000 trainees, contributing to the development of the industry.
 
“The two award-winning professors are those who silently struggle for their creative thinking and enthusiasm in research and industry-university cooperation to raise Korea’s engineering status in the world. The two professors who have contributed to not only Seoul National University's College of Engineering but also to the development of Korea's industries with a sense of duty are a model for delivering the message of continuous challenging and overcoming the limitations of our society,” said Dean Kookheon Char.
 
“Seoul National University's College of Engineering has made remarkable progress through its faculty and members' innovation and should have the ease of showing true leadership within society to overcome the national crisis and contribute to society in the turn of this new normal of the COVID-19 era and the 4th Industrial Revolution,” he emphasized, in addition to his congratulatory remarks.