GWACHEON, South Korea (AP) --
South Korea announced Wednesday that a 30-year-old expert on artificial
intelligence will be the country's first person in space when he flies on a
Russian Soyuz capsule to the International Space Station next year.
The Ministry of Science and
Technology selected Ko San, who has done research on artificial intelligence,
said Vice Science Minister Chung Yoon.
Ko beat out Yi Soo-yeon, a
29-year-old female mechanical engineer, following performance and other tests during
training in Russia.
"Ko proved to be more
comfortable communicating with the Russian cosmonauts and he scored higher on
performance and scientific experiment tests," Chung said.
Ko, who
has a master's degree in artificial intelligence from the elite Seoul National
University, will
work on the International Space Station for about 10 days with two Russian
cosmonauts next April, conducting scientific experiments.
"I am so happy this
very moment and thank you," Ko said in a statement issued by the ministry.
Both Ko and Yi have been
employed by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute since being selected for
astronaut training.
Ko previously worked on
computer vision and artificial intelligence at the Samsung Advanced Institute
of Technology, but plans to carry out research into robotics after the space
mission.
The ministry's Chung said
that Ko must continue to meet training expectations or risk being replaced. Yi
will remain in a space mission backup role.
Ko's mission next year will
make South Korea the world's 35th country and Asia's sixth to send an astronaut
into space, the ministry said.
South Korea is scheduled to
complete the country's first space center in Goheung by the end of next year, a
move aimed at laying technological and scientific groundwork for space
exploration in coming decades.
Since 1992, South Korea has
had 11 satellites launched, mostly
for space and ocean observation and communications, according to the ministry.
"South Korea's space
research is 40 to 50 years behind that of other developed nations," Chung
said.
"We currently lack the
technology to develop our own capsule to send into space, therefore we believe
first investing in human talent is more efficient in speeding up our space
research project," he added.
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