Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), South Korea
Se-Young Jeong was born in 1958 in Korea. He graduated from department of physics of University of Pusan in 1981 and received his Ph.D. in Natural Science from Köln University, Germany. Since 1991, he has been a professor in the Department of Physics and the College of Nano Science and Technology at Pusan National University, conducting research on various single crystals, including those with ferroelectric and ferroelastic materials, wide bandgap semiconductor like GaN, and superconducting MgB₂. He has also pursued research in spintronics based on ZnCoO. Since the 2000s, his research has mainly focused on the electrical properties of pure metal single crystals such as copper. Notably, he successfully grew single-crystal copper thin films with atomically flat surface, leading to a new phase in his research. Recently, he has uncovered the oxidation-resistant mechanism of single-crystal copper thin films with ultra-flat surfaces that prevent oxidation at room temperature, and he has addressed various challenging issues related to oxidation. Currently, he is pioneering a new field called "metaltronics," exploring the possibility of realizing various device functionalities using metals alone, without semiconductors. He was awarded the Busan Science Award in 2005, the Pusan National University’s 1st Educator Award in 2013, the Korean Physical Society Meritorious Service Award in 2016, and the 2022 Yoon In-koo Academic Award. In 2022, his research was selected as one of Korea’s Top 10 Nanotechnology Breakthroughs, and in 2023, it was named one of the Top 100 National R&D Excellence Achievements, where it was further recognized as the Best Research Achievement. In 2024, he received the POSCO TJ Park Science Award. Since 2024, he has been serving as an invited professor at KAIST and Harvard University.