The Ministry of Science and ICT, jointly with the Ministry of Health and Welfare, announced on the 11th that Kim Hwajong, Director of the AI New Drug Convergence Research Institute at the Korea Pharmaceutical and Bio-Pharma Manufacturers Association, has been appointed as the new project leader for the "Federated Learning-Based New Drug Development Acceleration Project."
The "Federated Learning-Based New Drug Development Acceleration Project" is an initiative aimed at shortening the new drug development period and reducing costs by utilizing a federated learning model that trains artificial intelligence (AI) at individual institutions without aggregating data held by multiple companies and organizations in one place.
Federated learning enables training without externally leaking the data held by each institution, thereby minimizing the risk of information leakage and allowing for both the 'protection' and 'utilization' of sensitive information simultaneously. Through this, it is expected that data held by domestic pharmaceutical companies can be jointly utilized to create an AI-based new drug development ecosystem.
Kim Hwajong, the new project leader, has served as a professor in the Department of Computer Engineering at Kangwon National University for over 30 years, conducting numerous research and development (R&D) projects in information technology (IT) and new drug development. He is recognized as an expert with extensive experience and know-how in the field of AI federated learning. In January, he was appointed as the inaugural director of the AI New Drug Convergence Research Institute at the Korea Pharmaceutical and Bio-Pharma Manufacturers Association and has been active in this role.
Project leader Kim Hwajong expressed his ambition, stating, “With the experience and expertise accumulated over the past 30 years, I will dedicate myself to this project to achieve meaningful results in the field of AI new drug development.”
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