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Bae Choong-sik is the 18th president of KAIST (Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology).

He faces the tasks of quickly normalizing problems such as delays in policy implementation caused by a 16-month vacancy in the presidency and restoring trust in the global academic community, which was damaged after KAIST was excluded from evaluations by a major global university ranking organization.

He was born on March 27, 1963, in Geumsan, South Chungcheong Province.

He graduated from the Department of Aeronautical Engineering at Seoul National University and earned a master’s degree in aeronautical engineering from the university’s graduate school. He received a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Imperial College London in the United Kingdom.

He worked as a researcher at the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, now the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, and as an engineering researcher at Imperial College London in the United Kingdom.

After being appointed a professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Chungnam National University, he moved to KAIST as a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering.

In July 2026, he took office as president of KAIST.

He is a leading authority in environmentally friendly energy and carbon-neutral power engineering. He is a full member of the National Academy of Engineering of Korea.

He has served as a technical adviser to Hyundai Motor, a specially appointed professor at the Institute of Science Tokyo, formerly Tokyo Institute of Technology, and a distinguished professor at Korea Electric Power Corp. He has also participated in shaping national science and technology policy, including serving as chair of the climate division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Science and Technology Diplomacy Advisory Committee.

He became the first Korean to be named an SAE Fellow, the highest level of recognition in the powertrain field, by SAE International.

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