Arsenic is a very toxic substance most widely used for wood preservers because it is a strong killer of insects and bacteria. It is also being applied in the manufacture of agrichemicals such as pesticides, insecticides and herbicides; but its usage has been declining because of adverse effects on the environment.Due to its odorless and colorless character, and its capacity to become transferred easily, arsenic intake can occur accidentally by drinking allegedly “clean” water. The World Health Organization estimated that approximately 57 million people worldwide are drinking arseni..

A Newly Discovered Mechanism May Lead to Climate RegulationAteam of environmentalphotochemists led by Professor Wonyong Choi of POSTECH has succeeded in explaining how natural ice in Polar Regions can provide the ocean with bioavailable iron content, which ultimately contributes to the prevention of global warming. This achievement in research has gained substantial attention from the international community as it was introduced in several well-known publications in the field of science and technology such as the May 6th issue of Environmental Science & Technology, and the May 17th issue o..

Anisotropic Fatigue Behavior of Magnesium Alloys InvestigatedENVIRONMENTAL protection has surfaced as a major problem that the world needs to solve, and there is no doubt that car pollution takes up a large portion of it. Therefore, the need for eco-friendly cars or ‘Green cars’ with lower emissions and more fuel efficiency is has increased, which explains why the recent work on the related subject conducted by POSTECH and the Korea Research Institute of Standards Science (KRISS) is gaining significance. It has been reported that Professor Chong Soo Lee and Sung Hyuk Park, a Ph.D. ..

The Core Technology for Ultrafast Silicon Device THE core technology that enables the realization of the fastest, nearly massless electrons has been successfully devised by a research team led by Professor Han Woong Yeom, Director of the Center for Atomic Wires and Layers at POSTECH. This achievement may lead to a breakthrough in the development of a truly new technology for semi-conductor devices. Professor Yeom’s team successfully developed a core technology that will enhance the speed of a silicon device by several ten-folds through utilizing the interface, which is the boundary betwe..

Professor Hyung Joon Cha (Department of Chemical Engineering) and his team have succeeded in developing a highly condensed liquid bio-adhesive material based on the mussel adhesive proteins (MAPs) by complex coacervation, which shows superior adhesive properties. Recently, MAPs found in byssus of mussel, have come to be recognized as useful biomaterials for direct use as bio-adhesives in medical applications and in the engineering of new marine-inspired adhesive materials. As purified natural MAPs are difficult to obtain, it has not been possible to experimentally validate the complex coacerva..

Professor Youngsook Lee (Division of Integrative Biology and Biotechnology) and her team have found a transporter carrying abscisic acid (ABA), a stress hormone, synthesized in plants undergoing stresses like extreme climate or salinity. Their results integrate ABA dependent signaling and transport processes, and it is expected to open a new venture for the engineering of drought-tolerant plants.They have succeeded to find the existence of transporter ABCG40 that can transport ABA, a hormone known to be produced in responses to environmental stress such as extreme temperatures, high salinity, ..

Professor Jaesung Park (Department of Mechanical Engineering) and Korea- America co-research team including medical school of Harvard University have succeeded in observing the mutual interaction between the layers of primary hepatocyte (liver) cells and non-parenchymal (functional) cells created by the stencil created by the microfabrication techniques.To treat damaged or diseased liver tissue, hepatic tissue engineering has been studied as a new therapeutic approach. The reconstruction of functional hepatic tissue mainly depends on the ability to control factors that influence the cell envir..

Many studies have addressed the effect of sugar in the diet on obesity and diabetes. Professor Seung-Jae Lee (Division of IT Convergence Engineering, Department of Life Science, School of Interdisciplinary Bioscience and Bioengineering) and his group report that it might also be taking years off the life span.Professor Lee’s group, in collaboration with Professor Cynthia Kenyon of the University of California, San Francisco, discovered that glucose inhibits the activities of the glycerol channel in C. elegans, shortening the life span of the worm by about 20 percent. The group traces the..

Despite its potential risks, general anesthesia and how it leads human brain to unconsciousness is still not known. A POSTECH research group has been investigating the nature of consciousness as well as control of the level of consciousness through anesthesia, whose effort has drawn much attention of the academia.Professor Seunghwan Kim (Department of Physics) and his team, in a joint study with POSTECH graduate Doctor UnCheol Lee of University of Michigan and a Seoul Asan Medical Center team, have presented evidence that the transition from consciousness to unconsciousness occurs by the suppr..

Professor Kijung Yong (Department of Chemical Engineering) and his group have succeeded in developing an original technology utilizing the lotus effect, which may be used toward development of a variety of applications using coated surfaces.Leaves of the lotus flower have very high water repellency due to the complex, nanoscopic structure of their surface. Superhydrophobic nanostructured surfaces, such as the lotus leaf, have shown potential for a variety of applications, including microfluidics in biotechnology, fog-resistant coatings, impermeable textiles, anti-contamination, and self-cleani..