-Envoys & Senior Diplomats gather to search cooperative ways in Science, Technology and Innovation
With ‘Its first KAIST Embassy Day', KAIST located in Daejeon, Republic of Korea is
stepping up its initiative for building global competitiveness.
The attendance of a total of 20 Ambassadors roughly in addition to almost 70 senior
diplomats showed that the Embassy Day hosted on June 23 afternoon in a hotel Seoul
will be a stepping stone to diversify its channels for promoting the global presence of
KAIST. From the Seoul Diplomatic Corps., Guatemala Amb. Herbert Estuardo MENESES
CORONADO, Norway Amb. Jan Ole GREVSTAD, Germany Amb. Stephan AUER, Latvia
Amb. Peteris VAIVARS, Rwanda Amb. Emma-Francoise ISUMBINGABO, Belarus Amb. Andrei POPKOV, Switzerland Amb. Linus von
Castelmur, Spain Amb. Gonzalo ORTIZ, Austria Amb. Elisabeth BERTAGNOLI, EU Amb.
Michael REITERER, Czech Amb. Tomas Husak, Canada Amb. Eric WALSH, Kenya Amb.
Mohamed GELLO, Costa Rica Amb. Rodolfo SOLANO QUIROS, Thailand Amb. Sarun
CHAROENSUWAN, Turkey Amb. Arslan Hakan OKCAL, Turnisia Amb. Mohamed Ali
NAFTI, Philippines Amb. Raul HERNANDEZ and last but not least Australia Amb. James
Choi etc. showed up to search cooperative ways with KAIST in terms of science
technology education & innovation.
According to the press team of KAIST, KAIST invited the foreign diplomatic corps from
Seoul to share their successful journey to emerge as the world-class university with a form of briefing conference rather than simple Daejeon campus
tour. The event featured KAIST’s research highlights, academic experiences, and global environment through
presentations by faculty and students.
In his welcoming address, KAIST President Sung-Chul Shin said that he hopes for brains from around the world to come to KAIST and
believes this event will serve as an opportunity to spread the global reputation of KAIST
more widely. President Shin, who took office in March this year, ambitiously hosted this
event for the first time, saying, “We didn’t expect this big of a response from the diplomats. The presence of this leading group
of diplomats reflects how KAIST’s reputation has blossomed.”
Nearly 100 diplomats from 65 countries attended the event held at the Grand Hyatt
Seoul, according to KAIST. Among the participants were Australian Amb. James Choi,
Canadian Amb. Eric Walsh, EU Amb. Michael Reiterer and German Amb. Stephan Auer
etc., all advanced countries in terms of their science, technology and innovation
university education level, reflecting the growing interest in the advancements in science
and technology education and innovation in KAIST.
The entire leadership team of KAIST turned out for the event including Provost O-Ok
Park, Associate Vice President of the International Office Jay Hyung Lee, and Associate
Vice President of Admissions Hayong Shin to provide an update on KAIST activities as
well as admission policies, and make a new network with the foreign envoys.
At the event, KAIST presented some of its latest research highlights that are gaining
international acclaim. Professor Jun-ho Oh, director at the Humanoid Robot Research Center talked on the short history
of the development of the KAIST humanoid robot, HUBO, which won the DARPA
Robotics Challenge (DRC) in 2015. Distinguished Professor Sang-Yup Lee, dean of the KAIST Institute, which is the center of multidisciplinary research
projects in KAIST, made a presentation on advances in metabolic engineering. In
addition, Professor David Helfman of the Department of Biological Science shared his
research on breast cancer and metastasis.