□ The Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science & Technology (DGIST; President Kunwoo Lee) announced that it held the DGIST Future Insight Forum at El Tower, Yangjae-dong, Seoul at 10:00 am on Jul 23, 2025 (Wed).
□ The forum was organized to share the research vision for three future strategic areas DGIST has focused on promoting—physical AI, human digital twins, and quantum sensing—and to discuss what implications these technologies will have for future society and how we can achieve interdisciplinary development with them.
□ The forum started with a keynote lecture titled The Age of Interdisciplinarity: The Beginning of the Post-AI Paradigm Beyond the AI Revolution delivered by Adjunct Professor Jihoon Jeong at DGIST, which was followed by a progress report regarding the activities of the Future Strategic Field Discovery Committee (hereinafter referred to as the "Future Committee"), presentations from each of the strategic fields, and a panel discussion.
□ To begin with, in the field of physical AI, the importance of AI was highlighted as a critical technology combined with a variety of systems such as humanoid robots, service robots, autonomous vehicles, and wearable devices to solve real-life problems such as manufacturing, logistics, and disaster response, as AI technology expands from simple information processing to the real world.
□ In the field of human digital twins, a presentation noted that previous research faced difficulties in diagnosis and treatment due to data fragmentation and organ-specific limitations, and suggested the possibility of comprehensively interpreting and utilizing biological health data by predicting interactions between the body and environment based on large-scale and multi-layered biological data.
□ In the field of quantum sensing, it was explained that quantum properties such as quantum entanglement and coherence could be used to measure high-sensitivity and high-resolution physical quantities, which are difficult to measure with traditional sensors. More specifically, the forum introduced applications across a variety of next-generation science and technology research areas, including quantum navigation, gravity sensors, and single-cell analysis, and highlighted how far the impact of the technologies can reach.
□ “In the past year, we have tried to identify flagship research areas that DGIST will focus on developing under the leadership of the Future Committee,” DGIST President Lee said. “We will continue to focus our research capacity on three strategic areas to reinvent DGIST as a research institute that creates and delivers innovative breakthroughs.”
□ Meanwhile, DGIST has operated the Future Committee since July last year to identify the strategic areas that can potentially contribute to national and regional development beyond R&D, including developing human resources, commercializing technologies, and creating industrial ecosystems. President Euijun Yoon of the National Academy of Engineering of Korea was appointed Chair of the Future Committee, which is comprised of nine early career researchers at DGIST, the Vice President for Academic Affairs, and the Vice President for Research and Development. The Committee has had more than 14 meetings over the past year to keep vibrant discussions going.
□ The Future Committee confirmed physical AI, human digital twins, and quantum sensing as the final strategic areas after comprehensively reviewing the importance of different fields, future directions, domestic and international technology trends, DGIST's infrastructure, and potential connections with local industries. DGIST plans to attract large-scale national projects, develop experts, strengthen research competitiveness, and proactively push for technology commercialization with the Strategic Promotion Group for each of the fields.
