Prof. Hyun Taek-hwan stands good chance of winning Nobel Prize

Chemical and biological engineering chair professor Hyun Taek-hwan of Seoul National University (SNU) has been listed on a list of candidates considered likely to win the Nobel Prize.

Clarivate Analytics, a research data analytics company, announced on Wednesday 24 highly cited researchers for 2020 based on citations in about 50 million papers produced by researchers all around the world. The list includes four physiologists, seven physicians, six chemists and seven economists, among whom 19 work at U.S. research centers. Professor Hyun is the only Korean scientist who made it to the list.

Clarivate has published an annual list of highly cited researchers in physiology, physics, chemistry and economics since 2002 before the Nobel Prize announcements. The list identifies researchers who produced papers ranking in the top 0.01 percent by citations for their field. The criteria also include qualitative factors such as ingenuity and contribution. Between 2002 and 2019, 54 out of 336 who made it to the list won Nobel Prizes, and 29 of them won the prizes within two years of the announcement, which has given the list the nickname of a Nobel Prize predictor.

As an authority on nanocrystal synthesis, Professor Hyun has been listed in chemistry. One of his major achievements include the development of the “heat-up process,” a standardization technology that synthesizes nanoparticles in the same size on a large scale, which has expanded the application of nanoparticles. He has published more than 400 papers, seven of which have been cited for more than 1,000 times. Only 0.025 percent of papers in chemistry have been cited more than 1,000 times.


ashilla@donga.com