Professor Nam Hyo-seok of Yonsei University College of Medicine Awarded the Yuhan Medical Science Grand Prize

Yuhan Corporation and the Seoul Medical Association announced on the 17th that they held the 57th Yuhan Medical Awards ceremony on the 15th at the Grand Ballroom of the Chosun Hotel in Sogong-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul.

Hwang Gyu-seok, President of the Seoul Medical Association; Seok Jun, Assistant Professor, Department of Dermatology, Chung-Ang University (Young Medical Scientist Award recipient); Nam Hyo-seok, Professor, Department of Neurology, Yonsei University College of Medicine (Grand Prize recipient); Kim Young-chan, Assistant Professor, Department of Internal Medicine, Seoul National University (Young Medical Scientist Award recipient); and Kim Yeol-hong, President of Yuhan Corporation (from left), are posing for a commemorative photo at the 57th Yuhan Medical Awards ceremony.
[Photo by Yuhan Corporation]

The Grand Prize of the 57th Yuhan Medical Awards was awarded to Professor Nam Hyo-seok of the Department of Neurology at Yonsei University College of Medicine, while the Young Medical Scientist Awards were given to Associate Professor Seok Jun of the Department of Dermatology at Chung-Ang University and Associate Professor Kim Young-chan of the Department of Internal Medicine at Seoul National University, respectively. The grand prize winner received a prize of 50 million KRW, and each young medical scientist awardee received 15 million KRW.

The 57th Yuhan Medical Awards aimed to promote overall medical advancement by selecting winners across various fields including internal medicine, surgery, basic medical sciences, and support fields during the evaluation process. Professor Nam Hyo-seok, the grand prize winner, was highly recognized for demonstrating that conventional blood pressure control is more effective than aggressively lowering blood pressure after intra-arterial vascular recanalization treatment. Associate Professor Seok Jun, a young medical scientist awardee, was honored for his research revealing for the first time in the world that virtual memory T cell populations can induce alopecia areata, an autoimmune disease. Associate Professor Kim Young-chan was recognized for showing that differences in the barriers between tissues at the central nervous system boundary regions suggest that the dura mater plays an important role in the movement of immune cells and infectious agents.

In addition to the awardees, the ceremony was attended by Hwang Kyu-seok, President of the Seoul Medical Association, and Kim Yeol-hong, President of Yuhan Corporation. President Hwang said, “The Seoul Medical Association will actively strive to ensure that many people dedicated to medical research have opportunities to receive the Yuhan Medical Awards.” President Kim stated, "We will continue to make efforts so that the Yuhan Medical Awards contribute not only to the realization of creative research achievements by medical educators and researchers but also to the infinite development of the medical field."

The Yuhan Medical Awards are organized by the Seoul Medical Association and sponsored by Yuhan Corporation. Established in 1967 with the purpose of laying the foundation for future medical advancement and encouraging the research enthusiasm of medical scientists, it has served as a driving force for the development of domestic medicine. To date, it has produced more than 100 awardees representing the Korean medical community and has established itself as the most prestigious academic award system in the country.