Byung Il Kim, a physics professor at Boise State University, is a leading expert in atomic force microscopy (AFM) where he has worked for more than 30 years. A decade ago he developed a unique technique called COIFM, which led to the discovery of self-assembled water chains. He obtained his Bachelor of Science in Physics at KAIST in Korea. For his Master of Science research project at Seoul National University, he constructed an entire AFM system, the first one to be used in Korea. For his Ph. D research, he applied the home-made AFM system for topographic imaging of high-temperature superconducting thin films, magnetic domain imaging of magnetic thin films, and water-based nano-oxidation patterning on semiconducting surfaces. After his PhD, he came to the United States as a post-doc researcher at the University of Houston. He conducted researches about nanotribology and chiral recognition of organic self-assembly in ultrahigh vacuum environments. Then, he moved to Sandia National Laboratories where he studied fundamental mechanisms for adsorption and desorption of proteins on switchable bio-active surface. Prof. Kim has taught analog and digital electronics and undergraduate/graduate level biophysics for about 20 years. He also enjoys teaching general physics labs for non-physics majors without using complicated physical terminology or calculus. As an effort to share his research work with the general public, he talked to approximately three hundred people about chain-like water at TEDx Boise in 2019. Professor Kim was also a visiting professor at Seoul National University in 2012-2013.
