Kim Kimoon

Kim Kimoon is a South Korean materials chemist and professor in the Division of Advanced Materials Science at Pohang University of Science and Technology.

Kim received his B.S. degree from Seoul National University (1976), M.S. degree from Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST, 1978, advisor: Prof. Mu Shik Jon), and Ph.D. degree from Stanford University (1986; advisor: Prof. James P. Collman). After two year postdoctoral work at Northwestern University (advisor: Prof. James A. Ibers) he started his own academic career at the Department of Chemistry, Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH) in 1988 where he is now Distinguished University Professor (POSTECH Fellow).

His current research focuses on developing novel functional materials and devices based on supramolecular chemistry. In particular, his group has been working on a wide variety of functional materials based on cucurbiturils, a family of pumpkin-shaped macrocyclic molecules, and metal-organic porous materials useful for catalysis, separation and gas storage.

Kim has authored and coauthored 240 papers which have been cited more than 14,300 times with an h-index of 63. Most of his work has been published in the high impact journals such as Nature, Nature Chemistry, Angewandte Chemie, and the JACS.

In particular, the paper published in Nature in 2000, which reported the synthesis of homochiral nanoporous crystalline materials using self-assembly and an application for a chiral catalyst, was selected as one of the 35 most notable papers among chemical related papers published in Nature from 1950 to 2000 including Watson and Crick’s DNA structure, Kroto and Smalley’s discovery of the fullerene, Nicolaou’s Taxol total synthesis, etc.

Since 1997, Kim has been the director of the Center for Smart Supramolecules supported by Creative Research Initiatives and later by Acceleration Research program sponsored by the Korean Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (MEST). Until recently, he has also been in charge of the Division of Advanced Materials Science (AMS), launched in 2008 with a support from the World Class University (WCU) project of the MEST, as project leader. He has played a key role in establishing research and education programs of AMS. He was named the director of the Center for Self-assembly and Complexity (CSC), Institute for Basic Science (IBS) on August 1, 2012 by the Korean government.

• 1995 Yonam Fellowship, Yonam Foundation
• 1997 Best Paper Award, Korean Federation of Science and Technology Societies
• 1998 Outstanding Research Award, Division of Inorganic Chemistry, KCS
• 1999 Distinguished Research Award, Korean Chemical Society, KCS
• 2000 Korean Academy of Science and Technology, member elected
• 2000 Scientist of the Month, Korea Science and Engineering Foundation
• 2001 Doyak Medal, the Order of Science & Technology Merit, Korean Government
• 2002 TWAS Prize, Third World Academy of Sciences
• 2002 Korea Science Prize, Korean Government
• 2003 Korean Academy of Science and Technology, elected Fellow
• 2005 Visiting Professorship, University of Strasbourg
• 2006 Named as a Role Model Scientist, Ministry of Science and Technology
• 2006 Ho-Am Prize in Science, Hoam Foundation, Samsung
• 2007 Prime Minister Prize, Science Innovation Section, NANO KOREA Awards
• 2007 Named as an Outstanding Scientist in 2008, Ministry of Science and Technology
• 2008 Best Scientist and Engineer Award, Korean Government
• 2009 POSTECH Fellow, elected
• 2009 Proud Postechian Award, POSTECH
• 2011 E. Muetterties Memorial Lectureship Award, University of California, Berkeley
• 2012 Honorary Professor, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences
• 2012 Izatt-Christensen Award