Dr. Yongchan Kim (Institute for Molecular Biology and Genetics, PI Byung‑Hoon Jeong) has been selected for the 'Sejong Science Fellowship,' an Individual Basic Research Program of the Ministry of Science and ICT.

The 'Sejong Science Fellowship' is a program that encourages and supports research immersion through fellowships so that young scientists, such as postdoctoral researchers, can conduct creative, independent research and grow and establish themselves as key national science and technology talents. During the research period, recipients receive KRW 130 million in research funding per year for five years.

Through this support, Dr. Kim will carry out a research project titled 'Molecular Genetic Research for Proactive Prevention of Prion Diseases and Development of Candidate Therapeutics Based on Multi‑Omics.'

Prion diseases are a type of zoonotic infectious disease that destroy nerve cells in the brains of animals and humans. Representative examples include Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease in humans and bovine spongiform encephalopathy in cattle.

Dr. Kim graduated from the Department of Molecular Biology at Jeonbuk National University (JBNU) and earned his Ph.D. in the Department of Bioactive Material Sciences from the university's Graduate School. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Molecular Biology and Genetics at JBNU. Over the past four years, he has published six papers in internationally renowned journals ranked in the top 10% and has published a total of 43 SCI‑level papers as first author.

He has also served as the principal investigator (PI) on research projects on proactive control of prion diseases—including the National Research Foundation of Korea's Global Ph.D. Fellowship (2018-2021) and the Postdoctoral Domestic Training Program (2021–present)—producing outstanding research results. He has received the Minister of Education Award, the Young Scientist Award from the Korean Society of Genomics, and JBNU's Excellent Research Award (President's Commendation), among others, earning recognition for his research excellence both domestically and internationally.