Yonsei University

Today’s activity lineup featured a more academic-focused theme. We set out early in the morning to the prestigious Yonsei University. In Korea, there are many colleges, however, there are three universities which are considered to be the Ivy-Leagues of Korea: Yonsei University, Korea University, and Seoul National University. As an overview, our visit at Yonsei consisted of various tours of different parts of the university.

General Tour

The first tour consisted of a general tour of the university. We visited various landmarks and open spaces, as well as, learned about some impressive facilities and amenities offered by the university. For instance, the new, Samsung funded engineering library is the largest university library in Korea. Furthermore, I was unaware that the Korean-based university was funded over a century ago by an Englishman, Horace Underwood. The tour guide explained that due to its rich international history, the university aims to accepts others from various countries with open arms through one of its many study abroad programs.

As the tour progressed, we visited the Electrical and Electronic Engineering wing of the school where we took a peek at three different rooms with students working in various circuit-related problems. Scattered throughout the students’ desks were many components, some I recognized including capacitors, resistors, wires, and a circuit board. As a future computer engineering students, seeing the equipment the Koreans had at their disposals for tackling electrical and computer engineering (ECE) problems was a treat! I even witnessed a few utilizing Visual Studio Code as their designated Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for their respective coding tasks. If we had the time, I would have loved to chat with them and learn more about the tasks they were completing and their time at Yonsei.

Research Laboratories

At the conclusion of the campus facilities-focused tour, we were able to visit two research laboratories in Yonsei, one focused on nanotechnologies and the other on bioengineering. The first lab was part of the Yonsei Center for Research Facilities. While the center consists of many labs, we witnessed a few with some impressive and expensive machinery aimed towards the better understanding of minuscule patterns. In other words, the scientists performed experiments with large, custom-made microscopes, such as the Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope, to better understanding relations at the nano-level.

The second lab was led by former Swanson School of Engineering Ph.D. student Dr. Cheong. The Cheong Laboratory maintained a focus on bioengineering through various experiments aimed at revealing more information about the human body. For instance, one of their experiments focused on degenerative diseases, such as Alzheimers. For many of their experiments, test subjects in the form of rats were used. These rats contained a helmet attached to their skull for easy manipulation by the researchers. While I was a bit startled by their experimental procedures in terms of test subjects, I genuinely found it interesting.

cellArtgen

To conclude our visit at Yonsei, we visited a start-up company located in the midst of the campus, called cellArtgen. While this company focuses on various products, the main research push is focused towards the creation of organs using stem cells. Even though I lack an academic interest in the field of Biology, I admired this rather impressive research goal.

“Success isn’t overnight. It’s when every day you get a little better than the day before. It all adds up”.

-Dwayne Johnson