PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Inkyung Jung

Also known as 정인경

Inkyung Jung is a genomics researcher at KAIST whose work combines 3D genome biology, single-cell multi-omics and deep learning. After earning a BS in 2006 and a PhD in 2011 at KAIST and working as a postdoctoral fellow at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research in San Diego from 2012 to 2016, they became an assistant professor at KAIST in 2016. Their chromatin-interaction studies include a 2015 Nature paper on stem cell differentiation and a 2019 Nature Genetics compendium across 27 human cell and tissue types. They coauthored the scHyena foundation model for brain single-cell RNA-seq in October 2023, received the 2024 ASAN Award for Young Medical Scientists, and co-developed scHiCAR with a deep-learning-based loop caller published in Nature Biotechnology in February 2026. Jung is an associate professor in KAIST's Department of Biological Sciences and an adjunct professor in its AX department.

Now at
KAIST
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Timeline

  1. 2006–2011

    BS and PhD at KAIST

    Jung earns a BS in biosystems at KAIST in 2006, followed by a PhD in bio and brain engineering at KAIST in 2011 under the advisor Dongsup Kim.

  2. 2012–2016

    Postdoc at the Ludwig Institute

    From 2012 to 2016, they work as a postdoctoral fellow at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research in San Diego. In 2015, with Jesse Dixon and Siddarth Selvaraj, they coauthor a Nature paper on chromatin architecture reorganization during stem cell differentiation.

  3. 2016–2020

    Assistant professor at KAIST

    In 2016, Jung becomes an assistant professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at KAIST, and in 2020 an associate professor.

  4. 2019

    Promoter-centered chromatin maps

    In 2019, Jung, Anthony Schmitt, Yarui Diao, Bing Ren and colleagues from KAIST and the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research publish a Nature Genetics paper that maps long-range chromatin interactions centered on 18,943 promoters in 27 human cell and tissue types. The study uses these maps to infer the target genes of 70,329 candidate regulatory elements.

  5. October 2023

    The scHyena foundation model

    In October 2023, they coauthor scHyena with Gyutaek Oh, Baekgyu Choi and Jong Chul Ye. The foundation model analyzes full-length single-cell RNA-seq data from the brain with a Transformer architecture inspired by the Hyena operator.

  6. 2024

    ASAN Award for Young Medical Scientists

    They receive the 2024 ASAN Award for Young Medical Scientists for investigating the 3D genome in disease-specific gene regulation.

  7. February 2026

    scHiCAR in Nature Biotechnology

    In February 2026, Nature Biotechnology publishes scHiCAR, developed by Jung's team at KAIST and Yarui Diao's team at Duke University. The method profiles mRNA, open chromatin and 3D genome contacts in the same single cells. Applied to 1.62 million mouse brain cells with a deep-learning-based loop caller, it defines enhancer–promoter pairs across 22 brain cell types.

  8. As of October 2026

    Professor at KAIST

    Since 2020, Jung is an associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at KAIST, and they also serve as an adjunct professor in KAIST's AX department, researching the 3D genome, gene regulation, epigenomics, single-cell multi-omics and deep learning. Their 3D genome work identifies target genes for non-coding mutations tied to diseases such as colorectal cancer and Parkinson's disease.

Career

  1. Since 2016KAISTAssistant Professor, Associate Professor
  2. 2012–2016Ludwig Institute for Cancer ResearchPostdoctoral fellow

Education

  1. 2011KAISTPhD
  2. 2006KAISTBS

From the biography.

  1. The United States employs an estimated 48% of people shaping AIIncludes KAIST. We estimate where the people shaping AI work today, how universities, companies and research institutes split across countries, and how country shares have changed since the 1960s.
  2. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes KAIST. We estimate where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led. Massachusetts Institute of Technology leads with 467 former students, including 291 recorded doctorates.
  3. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974Includes KAIST. We estimate where the people shaping AI worked when their most-cited papers appeared: the company share was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974, and Google led all organizations in 2020–2024.
  4. 44% of AI career moves go from one university to anotherIncludes KAIST. We estimate how 26,439 AI career moves link universities, companies, labs, nonprofits and government research centers, with decade counts, net flows and the top paths.

Colleagues

People with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Inkyung Jung yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. Inkyung Jung - Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology pure.kaist.ac.kr. Checked 22 October 2026.
  2. Chromatin architecture reorganization during stem cell differentiation | Nature nature.com. Checked 22 October 2026.
  3. A compendium of promoter-centered long-range chromatin interactions in the human genome | Nature Genetics nature.com. Checked 22 October 2026.
  4. scHyena: Foundation Model for Full-Length Single-Cell RNA-Seq Analysis in Brain arxiv.org. Checked 22 October 2026.
  5. Inkyung Jung – Asian Scientist Magazine asianscientist.com. Checked 22 October 2026.
  6. Trimodal single-cell profiling of transcriptome, epigenome and 3D genome in complex tissues with scHiCAR | Nature Biotechnology nature.com. Checked 22 October 2026.
  7. Breakthrough in Genetic Maps Decoding for Disease Insight | Mirage News miragenews.com. Checked 22 October 2026.
  8. Faculty | AX aicollege.kaist.ac.kr. Checked 22 October 2026.