Dr. Choi received his B.S. and M.S. in chemical engineering from Seoul National University and PhD in chemical engineering from University of Wisconsin-Madison. Since 1984, he has been a professor at Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at University of Maryland. His research area is polymer reaction engineering and he has published more than 200 journal articles, conference papers, and presentations, and a patent.
His research work has been focused on the mathematical modeling of various polymerization process systems including free radical polymerization, step-growth polymerization, and coordination polymerization of olefins. His research work involves detailed analysis of polymerization kinetics, nonlinear steady state and dynamic behaviors of continuous polymerization reactors, optimal control of polymerization reactors, on-line state estimation and parameter estimation in free radical and transition metal catalyzed olefin polymerization reactor processes. His recent research involves microreactors for process intensification, and nano-structured materials as catalytic reactors for polymerization. He has carried out numerous research projects with industry in US, Asia, Europe, and South America on various industrial polymerization processes. He has been one of the leading researchers in polyesters and polycarbonate synthesis, alpha-olefin polymerizations with Ziegler-Natta and metallocene catalysts. He is a member of AICHE and ACS, DECHEMA Scientific Committee for Polymer Reaction Engineering Workshop, International Editorial Board of Macromolecular Reaction Engineering. He received numerous awards including Poole & Kent Teaching Award from the University of Maryland as recently as 2018.