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Tae Seok Moon

SynBYSS Chair & EBRC Council Member
Engineering Biology Research Consortium

I am an EBRC (Engineering Biology Research Consortium) council member and a SynBYSS (Synthetic Biology Young Speaker Series) chair. I have expertise in systems and synthetic biology. I aim to solve global agricultural, environmental, manufacturing, and health problems through engineering biology. My research projects have been supported by the Gates Foundation, AIChE, and 13 governmental agencies (26 grants), and I have secured >$10M ($38M for the entire teams since 7/1/2012). These projects and my prior research efforts have resulted in 92 publications (81 as the PI), 179 invited talks, 170 contributed conference presentations, and 10 patents. My achievements have also been recognized with many awards, including a Langer Prize for Innovation and Entrepreneurial Excellence, a B&B Daniel I.C. Wang Award, an NSF CAREER award, an ONR Young Investigator Award, a John C. Sluder Fellowship (MIT), an ILJU Foundation Award, an LG Chemical Fellowship, and the SNU President Prize. I am deeply committed to spending the time required to promote the career development of my advisees and young researchers in the world. I have advised 115 young researchers who are diverse in race, gender, and nationality since 2012, including 6 iGEM teams, 18 PhD students, 3 MS students, 4 technicians, and 8 postdoctoral researchers. Many lab alumni are contributing to society (e.g., one developed the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine). I have been an active member of the global community of researchers who work in the fields of chemical engineering and bioengineering. I have actively participated in organizing many international conferences as a conference co-chair or organizer. I have also served as a reviewer, an editor-in-chief (New Biotechnology), an associate editor (8 journals), or an editorial board member (6 journals) for >50 journals, including Nature/Science/Cell journals, Nucleic Acids Res., and PNAS. Notably, my global leadership efforts include 1) my activity and role at EBRC as a Council Member to provide the vision to address national and global needs through synthetic biology and 2) my service to SynBYSS as the Founding Chair to provide a weekly, virtual, and multi-year forum where a global thought leader gives an opening 5 min talk, followed by a 45 min, rising star’s talk, for >1,000 global audiences. The 333 speakers include a Nobel Laureate, 21 National Academy Members, 22 funding agency directors, 20 Editors-in-chief, 9 Nature/Cell journal editors, and 161 rising stars.