A large number of scientific experts and organizations in Korea conduct scientific research. Unfortunately, however, Korea does not yet have a Nobel Prize laureate for its academic achievements. Therefore, many universities and research institutes, including Korea University (KU), are engaged in a fierce competition to achieve the honor of producing the first Nobel Prize winner in Korea. In July, KU was able to take a forward step toward a potential Nobel Prize, as Professor Ahn Jung Keun (Department of Physics) was selected as one of the Leader Researchers of the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF).
On July 1, NRF announced 17 Leader Researchers in various fields, including natural science, life science, medicine, pharmacy, engineering, and information communication technology (ICT). Because the title is granted to world-class researchers, the NRF strictly selects researchers, based on a preliminary assessment, assessments by international authorities, and presentations. When the researchers are nominated, the NRF provides them with an average of 800 million won annually for nine years.
The research team led by Professor Ahn focuses on the research of the Stellar Nucleosynthesis — a nuclear reaction at the inner part of stars represented as the sun. As it is a reaction that happens during the important phase of the lifetime of a star, the research about the chemical reaction is expected to provide important insights about the evolution of a star. This is because the nucleosynthesis of carbon and oxygen, the fundamental elements for birth and survival of living things, generates other heavy elements with various generation possibilities.
The team conducts research on how carbon and helium compound oxygen nucleus in high temperature circumstances, such as the center of the stars, which are two hundred million kelvins. The research team is planning to develop the low energy heavy-ion accelerator, time projection detector, gamma-ray detector, and superconducting magnet for the stellar nucleosynthesis research.
In particular, the low energy heavy ion accelerator will be designed to accelerate the carbon ion beam. Through the high-speed acceleration circumstance generated by the accelerator, the low temperature circumstance inside the center of a star — the two hundred million kelvin circumstance — will be formed. As the probability of a nuclear reaction between carbon ion and helium ion is particularly low, Professor Ahn mentioned that it is a difficult challenge to conduct nuclear reaction experiments with such circumstances.
The interest in stellar evolution by academia shows the high potentiality of this research and its significance as well. Therefore, intense research is expected to provide valuable insights into the secrets of the universe. Professor Ahn stated, “I want to research how various elements from hydrogen to uranium, which are elements with extreme mass difference, could exist on one planet, our Earth. Furthermore, it would be my aspiration to understand how the elements are still generated throughout the universe, even in low energy circumstances.”
With the support of NRF, the research team is expected to provide prominent insights toward stellar evolution and stellar nucleosynthesis. Also, the challenging research conducted by the research team will indeed contribute to the scientific advancement of humankind and training junior KU scholars. The junior KU scholars nurtured by the challenging research will bring a better and brighter future to the field of Korean science research.