Ri Seung-gi

RI SEUNG-GI (1905-1996). Ri was an important scientist. He was born in Damyang, now in the Republic of Korea, and educated at a local school. In 1931, he took a degree in chemistry at Kyoto University in Japan and received a Ph.D. in chemistry in 1939. While at Kyoto, he began to work on the synthetic fiber vinalon. At the end of World War II, he returned to Seoul and taught for a time at Gyeongseong University (Gyeongseong Jedae), which became Seoul National University in 1946. Ri was apparently unhappy with this development, and during the early stages of the Korean War in July 1950, he went to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). There he played a prominent role in the development of vinalon. He was a leading figure in the DPRK's nuclear program and possibly for other weapons-related programs. Ri was appointed head of the DPRK Atomic Energy Institute in June 1965. He headed the Hamheung branch of the Academy of Sciences from the 1960s until 1986. In 1998, he was commemorated on a DPRK postage stamp as the inventor of vinalon.

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