POSTECH Professor Wins the Samsung Ho-Am Prize

Professor Jisoon Ihm, a distinguished visiting professor in the Department of Physics at POSTECH, has been selected as the recipient of the 2023 Samsung Ho-Am Prize.

Dr. Ihm is a leading Korean theoretical physicist who has pioneered the field of computational materials physics by developing an innovative momentum-space formalism that accurately calculates the total energy of solids. This method enables the study of the structure and properties of solid materials without experiments.

His research has been applied to supercomputers and has become a crucial element in the design and synthesis of new materials, and is anticipated to significantly contribute to the development of new nanomaterials for energy storage and carbon dioxide removal. Recently, he has successfully synthesized a porous organic-inorganic hybrid compound that can effectively capture carbon dioxide and various harmful gases, and participated in the XPRIZE Carbon Removal competition launched by Elon Musk.

After receiving his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, Professor Ihm worked at MIT, AT&T Bell Labs, and Seoul National University before being invited to join POSTECH as a distinguished visiting professor in 2016.

The Samsung Ho-Am Prize was established in 1990 by Kun-Hee Lee, the late Chairman of Samsung, with a vision to continues the noble spirit of public service espoused by Byung-chull Lee, the founder of Samsung. The Prize is presented each year to individuals who have contributed to academics, the arts, and social development, or who have furthered the welfare of humanity through distinguished accomplishments in their respective professional fields. From POSTECH, Professor Kimoon Kim from the Department of Chemistry was the first recipient of the prize in 2006, and Professor Ihm is the fifth recipient, following Professor Yong-Geun Oh of the Department of Mathematics last year.