Ki Tae Nam

Ki Tae Nam is a South Korean materials scientist, engineer, and professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Seoul National University (SNU). He is known for his research in bioinspired materials, chiral nanomaterials, and electrochemical CO₂ utilization. He received the POSCO TJ Park Prize and Presidential Young Scientist Award

Early life and education Nam earned his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Materials Science and Engineering from Seoul National University. He received his Ph.D. in the same field from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he was awarded the Outstanding PhD Thesis Award in 2007 for his dissertation on virus-based electrochemical devices, including the first virus-based lithium-ion battery.

Career Following his doctorate, Nam conducted postdoctoral research at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's Molecular Foundry from 2007 to 2010. There, under Ron Zuckermann's guidance, he developed sequence-specific peptoid nanosheets—a breakthrough in peptide-mimetic materials published in Nature Materials.

In 2010, he joined SNU's faculty. His work has since spanned bioinspired synthesis of chiral plasmonic nanomaterials, electrochemical CO₂ conversion, and advanced optoelectronic applications.

Nam also contributes to national science and technology policy. In 2022 and 2023, he served on South Korea's Presidential Advisory Council on Science and Technology, among other strategic roles. In the field of bioinspired nanomaterials and energy applications, he co-authored a 2006 Science paper reporting the first battery built using genetically engineered viruses to assemble oxide nanowires for lithium-ion electrodes.

His contributions to chiral nanomaterials include a 2018 Nature study demonstrating amino-acid-directed synthesis of plasmonic gold nanoparticles with tailored chiral optical properties.

In 2022, he developed chiral sensors based on collective circular dichroism for enantioselective molecular detection, followed in 2024 by a Nature Materials publication elucidating the mechanistic pathways of chiral nanoparticle formation using generative approaches.

In electrochemical CO₂ utilization, Nam achieved the first electrochemical synthesis of dimethyl carbonate directly from CO₂ in a 2021 Nature Energy paper, and in 2024 reported the electrochemically initiated conversion of CO₂ into ethylene carbonate in Nature Synthesis. He has also advanced methods for CO₂ capture and conversion, including paired electrosynthesis and catalyst development, reinforcing his leadership in applied CO₂ electrochemistry.

Awards

Outstanding PhD Thesis Award, MIT (2007) POSCO TJ Park Prize (2022)

Selected publications