Future & Opportunity Symposium
Talk: International Collaboration: Smart and Effective Approaches
Prof. Yang Ki Hong
E.A Larry Drummon Endowed Chair fo Computer Engineering,
Electrical Engineering, College of Engineering, The University of Alabama
Dr. Yang-Ki Hong is a Professor of the Electrical & Computer Engineering Department and Materials Science Program and was the E. A. “Larry” Drummond Endowed Chair (2006 - 2023) at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL. He is the Director of NSF (National Science Foundation) IUCRC-UA: Center for Efficient Vehicles and Sustainable Transportation Systems. He received BS and MS (Condensed matter physics: Magnetism) in Physics from Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea, and Ph.D. in metallurgy from the University of Utah in 1981. In 1992, he completed the Program of Management Development (PMD), the Graduate School of Business Administration, Harvard University, Boston, MA. Before joining the University of Alabama as the Endowed Chair Professor in 2006, he was a Professor of Materials Science & Engineering and an Adjunct Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of Idaho, and Sr. Vice President of the R&D Division of OCI Company, Ltd., Seoul, South Korea.
Dr. Hong’s research focuses on electromagnetics, computational materials science, magnetic materials, and their applications to rare-earth-free permanent magnets for electric motors for electric vehicles, soft magnets for power electronics, 5G/6G antennas for telematics, and EMI in the 5G/6G frequency range. He has published about 200 refereed journal articles, presented about 270 peer-reviewed abstracts at international conferences and symposia, and delivered several plenaries, keynotes, invited papers, and 170 invited lectures and seminars. He holds 27 US and 9 Korea Patents.
Dr. Hong was a member of the technical committee of the IEEE Magnetics Society (2012 - 2017) and served on the program committee of the IEEE International Magnetics Conference (InterMAG) and International Conference on Magnetism and Magnetic Materials (MMM, AIP) and chaired many sessions for years. He was the publication committee chair for the 2016 IEEE International Conference on Microwave Magnetics. Dr. Hong is an Associate Editor of the Quantum Materials Section of “Frontiers in Materials” and an editorial board member of IEEE Magnetics Letters, Scientific Reports, Electronics, and Science of Advanced Materials.
Talk: AI Impact on Robots: Current and the Future
Prof. Dennis Hong
Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Samueli School of Engineering
University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA)
Dr. Dennis Hong, a TED alumnus, is a Professor and the Founding Director of RoMeLa (Robotics & Mechanisms Laboratory) of the Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Department at UCLA. His research focuses on robot locomotion and manipulation, autonomous vehicles and humanoid robots. He is the inventor of a number of novel robots and mechanisms, including the ‘whole skin locomotion’ for mobile robots inspired by how amoeba move, a unique three-legged waking robot STriDER, an air-powered robotic hand RAPHaEL, and the world’s first car that can be driven by the blind. His work has been featured on numerous national and international media. Washington Post magazine called Dr. Hong “the Leonardo da Vinci of robots.”
Dr. Hong has been named to Popular Science’s 8th annual “Brilliant 10”, honoring top scientists younger than 40 years of age from across the United States, “Forward Under 40” by the University of Wisconsin-Madison Alumni Association, and also honored as “Top 40 Under 40” alumni by Purdue University. Hong’s other past awards include the National Science Foundation’s CAREER award, the SAE International’s Ralph R. Teetor Educational Award, and the ASME Freudenstein / GM Young Investigator Award to name a few. Dr. Hong also actively leads student teams for various international robotics and design competitions winning numerous top prizes including the DARPA Urban Challenge where they won third place and the $500,000 prize, and the RoboCup, the international autonomous robot soccer competition where his team won First Place in both the Kid-Size and Adult-Size Humanoid divisions and brought the Louis Vuitton Cup Best Humanoid Award to the United States for the very first time.
Dr. Hong received his B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1994), his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University (1999, 2002).