Duke professor Jungsang Kim awarded South Korea high honor for quantum computing work - The Duke Chronicle

Duke professor Jungsang Kim was awarded South Korea’s Changjo Medal, the highest class within the nation’s leading honor for scientists and engineers, the Order of Science and Technology Merit. Kim, who works on quantum computing at Duke, is the Schiciano family distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering and the co-founder of quantum computing company IonQ. Kim received the medal April 21 from South Korean Prime Minister Kim Min-Seok in a ceremony in Seoul. “I grew up in Korean culture. I appreciated all the education and mentoring that I received during my early days, that put me on a passion for becoming a scientist,” Kim said. “... It was very special to go back to the origins, where all my parents, my siblings and my family are.” Kim also serves as an associate director of the Duke Quantum Center, where his work primarily focuses on trapped atomic ions in quantum computers. He uses the trapped ions in a vacuum and then manipulates them with lasers, using the electrically charged atoms to store information. Over the past 30 years, his goal has been to make quantum computing commercially viable. “Trapped atomic ions are a leading platform for first-generation quantum computers, but they are also fundamentally scalable to more powerful general purpose devices in future generations,” Kim wrote, alongside Duke Quantum Center Director Kenneth Brown and associate director Christopher Monroe, in a 2016 paper about the concept. Last year, Kim and his team marked an important milestone in the journey toward scaling up quantum computing. In November 2025, the U.S. Patent Office granted their patent for a “quantum computer based on manipulation of ion chains.” The new patent built on previous trapped-ion computing by initializing multiple ion chains in one trap. “It's something that I've been working on for over the last two decades of my career,” Kim said. “... We took that kind of fundamental science, started building systems that can actually do more useful computing, taking it all the way to commercially viable systems … [and that was what] I think the award was recognizing.” Kim was born and raised in South Korea, but then moved to the U.S. in 1992 for his doctorate at Stanford University. He later became an assistant professor at Duke in 2004. In 2015, Kim co-founded IonQ with Monroe as a Duke-based startup that has since gone public. He served as the company’s chief technology officer until 2024 and was named Duke’s chief science and technology strategist for the provost in February 2025. He also currently serves as a professor of physics. “Jungsang’s receipt of the Order of Science and Technology Merit is a distinction of the very highest order,” Jerome Lynch, Vinik dean of the Pratt School of Engineering, said in a press release. “His pioneering work to make trapped-ion quantum computing scalable and commercially viable has moved an entire field forward.” Compared to artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies, quantum computing is in a nascent stage. But Kim predicts quantum computing is on the rise. “Have we actually seen the ChatGPT or the large language model level of breakthrough in quantum? I don't think we've seen that yet, but I don't think that's very far away,” Kim said. “I think in the next few years, some of those early applications of useful quantum computers will very likely happen.” Kim will be among those leading the charge as the development of quantum technologies continues. “I think quantum is a very speculative area with very high risk, but also very high reward,” Kim said. “I would very strongly encourage young students who have a lot of career ahead of them to take some risks, jump into the fields that nobody else is working on and try to see if they can be a part of creating that future.