Lee Jeong-hwan, director of the Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS, President Lee Jeong-hwan), a government-funded research institute under the Ministry of Science and ICT, has been appointed as a distinguished professor in the Department of Advanced Materials Engineering at Kyungnam University.

Lee Jeong-hwan, director of the Materials Research Institute, attended the professor appointment ceremony held in the president's office of Kyungnam University on September 30 and promised to actively participate in nurturing future generations.

Kyungnam University, which has established itself as a prestigious private university in the region, actively seeks to provide career guidance and cultivate learning abilities for students by appointing distinguished professors who possess outstanding academic achievements or outstanding achievements in various fields of society and are highly respected.

This director joined the Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials (now the Korea Institute of Materials Science) in 1982 and has served in various positions, including Director of the Materials Forming Research Center, Director of the Industrial Technology Support Headquarters, and Director of the Senior Research Headquarters.

In addition, since the Materials Research Institute under the Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials was established in 2007, he has served as the Deputy Director and Director, making great efforts to elevate the institute to a national level. After the institute was promoted to the Korea Institute of Materials Science last year, his contributions were recognized and he was appointed as the first Director, where he remains to this day.

In addition, this director is the president of the Korean Society of Plastics and Plastic Processing and the founder of the Korean Federation of Engineers.He has contributed greatly to the development of local industries by serving as Chairman Won, Chairman of the Korea Industrial Technology Association, and Expert Member of the Gyeongnam Economic Innovation Promotion Committee. He has also actively supported the government's SME policies by serving as Chairman of the Policy System Committee of the Materials, Parts, and Equipment (hereinafter referred to as SME) Technology Special Committee of the National Science and Technology Advisory Council and Member of the Materials, Parts, and Equipment Competitiveness Enhancement Committee.

The director said, “The Fraunhofer Institute in Germany, recognized as the largest applied science research institute in Europe, has a cooperative system with universities in the city, and the director of the institute must be a university professor. In addition, the institute has a system in place where students from each university assist researchers in the form of interns.” He also said, “The Korea Research Institute of Materials Science also has an active human resource exchange system, such as key researchers concurrently holding positions as university professors or university professors becoming the principal investigators of research projects at government-funded research institutes. Through this opportunity, we will do our best to cultivate talents with customized knowledge and experience suitable for the development of local industries.”