Sukhwan Yoon

Sukhwan Yoon is a Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at KAIST. His research focuses on microbial reduction of nitrous oxide (N₂O), a potent greenhouse gas, with a decade-long investigation into ecophysiological mechanisms and the development of viable greenhouse-gas removal technologies. He leads the Environmental Microbiology Laboratory at KAIST, where his team has contributed significantly to understanding N₂O reduction in wastewater biological nitrogen removal (BNR) processes and agricultural soil management. Their work includes verifying the dominance of clade II nosZ in activated sludge microbiomes and developing a self-sustaining N₂O biofiltration system for practical implementation in BNR systems.

Key contributions include linking microbial physiology and genomics to environmental applications, particularly in microoxic environments where high-affinity N₂O-reducing organisms such as relatives of Dechloromonas and Azospira play critical roles. The lab’s overarching goals aim to advance sustainable environmental technologies through this research.