Six years running: a Kookmin chip engineer stays in the world's top 2% of scientists

Stacking chip layers ever higher is how computers keep getting stronger — but forming each new layer takes heat that can damage the finished layer beneath it. Choi Sung-jin, a professor of electronics engineering at Kookmin University in Seoul, works on exactly that problem: his team uses a laser to heat silicon for a very short time, crystallising it while sparing what lies below, and has built nanosheet transistors — devices made from extremely thin silicon layers — with the method. This week he appeared for the sixth consecutive year on the 'World's Top 2% Scientists' lists compiled by Stanford University and Elsevier, placing in roughly the top 1.3% of applied physicists by career impact and the top 0.9% for the most recent year. His work has been cited more than 25,000 times.

SDG 9 · Industry, innovation and infrastructure — Mechanism: tech innovation