POSTECH has established the University Professorship in efforts to recognize and further support its individuals of distinction. The title of POSTECH University Professor is to be bestowed to its tenured faculty members who are at the very forefront of excellence with powerfully influential research and knowledge.

University Professorship is known to have been first created at Harvard University in the U.S. in 1935 as the university’s most distinguished professorial post. Since then, the program has been adopted by numerous prestigious universities worldwide as one of the most honorable entitlements granted to faculty members whose scholarship and groundbreaking work exceeds the conventional boundaries of academic disciplines.

As the title of POSTECH University Professor is awarded only to faculty members who have demonstrated extraordinary achievements in teaching and research, the University Professors receive special honor and privileges. The benefits include extension in retirement age, special bonuses, and larger lab/office space with more graduate students, etc. 

There are currently two faculty members with this honorable title: Professor Kimoon Kim (Dept. of Chemistry) and Professor Kilwon Cho (Dept. Chemical Engineering).

Prof. Cho has been newly awarded with the title, while Prof. Kim, who had previously held the title of POSTECH Fellow, was automatically elevated to POSTECH University Professor as the former honorary professorship was integrated into the new one.

Since joining POSTECH in 1988, Prof. Cho has accomplished outstanding research achievements in flexible electronic materials based on organic semiconductor such as organic transistor and organic photovoltaics. In 2014, Thomson-Reuter listed Prof. Cho as one of the World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds based on the analysis of citation data over ten years (2002-2012). He also won the Duckmyeong Hanlim Engineering Award presented by the Korean Academy of Science and Technology in 2015 and was selected as the Scientist of the Month in 2010.

Prof. Cho gave a special lecture on Interface Engineering for Organic Electronics in commemoration of the distinction on March 9^th.