Taehyun (Tae) Kim

B.S., Seoul National University, 2023

Born and raised in Seoul, Korea, Tae earned his bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Seoul National University. With the bold ambition to explore all areas of chemistry that seemed interesting, Tae worked in five different research groups, only to figure out that five years of college still weren’t enough for that. Nevertheless, he found a passion for organic synthesis and chemical biology while working on topics ranging from Suzuki-Miyaura catalyst-transfer polymerization in Prof. Tae-Lim Choi’s lab, Co(II)-metalloradical catalysis in Prof. X. Peter Zhang’s lab, and BioID-based proximity labeling in Prof. Hyun-Woo Rhee’s lab. Fascinated by all the cool interdisciplinary research happening in the MacMillan group, Tae decided to move to the United States in 2023 to pursue his graduate studies. Outside of the lab, Tae enjoys hiking, cooking, painting, and discovering new hobbies—some of them being surfing, scuba diving, and tennis.

Fun Facts

• Tae considers walking to be the best transportation method and has a very generous standard for “walking distance”. In fact, he decided to walk 550 miles across the whole country of Spain before starting graduate school.
• As an avid traveler and foodie (on a budget), Tae would happily sleep in the cheapest hostels and splurge all of that money on food.
• With ordering bad food from a restaurant being one of his biggest fears, Tae has attempted to learn four languages just to understand the menu and ask for recommendations.