Oh Seung-eun appears on ‘You Quiz’ and reveals her current status
After graduating from the Department of Physics at Seoul National University, I went to study abroad.
Obtained a doctoral degree from MIT… Continue studying physics
On the tenure track at UC San Diego
“I want to continue doing fun and meaningful research.”
Photo = tvN broadcast screen capture The current status of Oh Seung-eun, the first person to get a perfect score on the College Scholastic Ability Test, who left behind the legendary quote, “What is HOT?”
Mr. Oh appeared on tvN’s ‘You Quiz on the Block’, which aired on the 3rd, and revealed an anecdote about the time he got a perfect score on the CSAT and his life after that.
Mr. Oh received a perfect score on the College Scholastic Ability Test in 1999. It became a hot topic at the time as it was the first perfect score in 30 years since national college entrance exams began in the preliminary examination in 1968. He also published seven books titled ‘Oh Seung-eun’s CSAT Notes’.
After receiving a perfect score on the CSAT, Oh entered the Department of Physics at Seoul National University, graduating early in 3 years and 6 months, and went to study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States in 2003. After receiving his doctorate from MIT in 2010, he moved to Harvard Medical School, where he spent seven years as a researcher studying biophysics.
Currently, he is on the tenure track at UC San Diego. Tenure is a system that guarantees a professor’s lifetime tenure at a university, and the tenure track is a process in which a person is appointed as an assistant professor and is reviewed to become a tenured professor.
On this day, MC Yoo Jae-seok said, “Aren’t you the person who left behind the legendary quote, ‘What is HOT?'” and Mr. Oh responded, “Now I know. They are the people who wrote the history of Korean K-pop.” He then explained, “It seems like the context has been distorted,” and “I know that HOT is a great group of people, and I know that my friends sing when I go to karaoke, but I don’t know much about it,” making people laugh.
Mr. Oh attracted attention by mentioning a ‘letter from a friend’ as the reason why he chose Seoul National University’s physics department over medical school after getting a perfect score on the CSAT. It is said that a long letter he received from a friend during his high school days contained the content, ‘A kid like you who is good at studying should pursue pure studies at the forefront of human knowledge.’ Mr. Oh confessed, “After reading the letter, I thought, ‘I guess so,’ and chose the physics department.”
I graduated early from the Department of Physics at Seoul National University after 3 years and 6 months and went on to study abroad.
At the time, Mr. Oh’s mother said, “Kids in medical school can drink water from six large jars, but aren’t you going into the Pacific Ocean and drowning yourself without knowing what to catch?” Medical school has a set course of 6 years, but the end of research is unknown.
However, Oh’s father encouraged his daughter, saying, “Jimaekjil is much more fun than drinking water from a jar.” Mr. Oh said, “My parents gave me a lot of support in doing what I wanted to do. They didn’t nag me and just believed in me. I’m so thankful.”
The foundation for studying abroad was ‘Seung-Eun Oh’s CSAT Notes,’ which were the CSAT notes that Oh had compiled herself during the winter vacation of her third year in high school. When asked whether he must have received a lot of royalties, Mr. Oh replied, “I really received an excessive amount of money. It is a level that is unthinkable for a high school student.”
It took seven years to graduate from MIT. Recalling his time studying abroad, he said, “If I had only lived in Korea, I would have lived only knowing I was good, but seeing the wider world was an opportunity to grow.” He added, “You can pass all classes in 1-2 years. I hope you immerse yourself in research from the beginning. “It was the place I wanted to be,” he said.
He continued, “During my lab rotation, in the second lab I went to, the professor suggested a hypothesis. I was a freshman who didn’t know anything, and I thought, ‘I think I can solve it in 6 months.’ But it couldn’t be solved, so it took 7 years. That hypothesis was wrong. “I graduated while revealing everything. It was good training,” he recalled. The research topic at the time was said to be ‘label-free optical measurement of nerve cell action potentials’.
Currently, he is on the tenure track at UC San Diego. Mr. Oh said, “I never thought I would study physics for this long, but I am thankful that I am enjoying it more than I expected.” He expressed his ambition, saying, “I want to continue to conduct interesting and meaningful research with open possibilities in the future.”
In addition, he expressed his wish, “Even if it takes a long time, I hope that Korean scholars will do more original research and the name will become more familiar to the public. It’s not something that’s far away, so I hope there will be more interest in science.”
Kim Soo-young, Hankyung.com reporter [email protected]
