Plenary

Luke Pyung-Se Lee is a Professor and Founding Director of K-BIGHEART at POSTECH, as well as a Professor at Harvard Medical School. He earned his BA in Biophysics and his Ph.D. in Applied Physics and Bioengineering from UC Berkeley, joining the faculty there in 1999 after a decade of industry experience. He has held prestigious positions, including the Arnold and Barbara Silverman Distinguished Professor and the Lester John and Lynne Dewar Lloyd Distinguished Professor at Berkeley, and served as Chair Professor in Systems Nanobiology at ETH Zürich. Additionally, he was the Tan Chin Tuan Centennial Professor and Associate President at the National University of Singapore. He also founded the Institute for Quantum Biophysics at Sungkyunkwan University in Korea. He has authored over 350 research articles, four book chapters, and holds 60 patents. He mentored 28 Ph.D. students and 35 postdoctoral fellows, with 40 becoming faculty members and 22 founding executives of startups. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering, and has received awards including the IEEE William J. Morlock Award, NSF Career Award, Fulbright Scholar Award, and HoAm Prize. 

Dr. Deok-Ho Kim is Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and founding Director of the Center for Microphysiological Systems and the Johns Hopkins Global Biotechnology Innovation Center. His research integrates biomaterials, micro/nanoengineering, stem cell biology, and tissue engineering to develop advanced human organ-on-chip and microphysiological systems for disease modeling, drug discovery, and regenerative medicine. Dr. Kim has authored over 200 peer-reviewed publications with more than 21,000 citations (H-index 76), and his work has been featured in Science Magazine, Nature News, and CNN. He is an elected Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), the American Heart Association (AHA), the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), and the Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening (SLAS). His honors include the Harold M. Weintraub Award, BMES Young Innovator Award, IEEE NANOMED Innovator Award, and KSEA Engineer of the Year Award. Dr. Kim is the scientific founder of Curi Bio, a biotechnology company developing human tissue platforms for drug discovery recognized with the 2020 Tibbetts Award and the 2021 Edison Award, and he previously served as President of the Korean-American Biomedical Engineering Society (KBMES). 

Dr.Eun-Suk Seo is a Professor in the Department of Physics and the Institute for Physical Science and Technology at the University of Maryland and an elected Fellow of the American Physical Society. Her research focuses on the origin, acceleration, and propagation of cosmic rays, including searches for exotic matter such as antimatter and dark matter through direct measurements using balloon-borne and space-based instruments. She has led sustained experimental programs that extend direct cosmic-ray measurements to unprecedented high energies, bridging the gap between space-based detectors and ground-based observatories.

Dr. Seo has led major international missions as Principal Investigator of CREAM (Cosmic Ray Energetics and Mass) and ISS-CREAM aboard the International Space Station and served as institutional Principal Investigator for the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) on the ISS. She is a recipient of numerous awards, including the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers and multiple NASA Group Achievement Awards. She previously served as the 46th President of the Korean-American Scientists and Engineers Association and currently serves as the founding President of the Korean-American AeroSpace Science and Technology Association.