Lee Jung-dong, head of the Grand Quest project, explains the challenges at the “Grand Quest Forum” held at SNU’s Gwanak campus on the 18th. Photo courtesy of Seoul National University
“In the age of artificial intelligence (AI), are democracy and capitalism sustainable?” “Can we control the clock of life?”
Seoul National University (SNU) has unveiled “six grand challenges” as it seeks to shift its research paradigm toward a question-centered approach. Research teams taking on the challenges will receive 500 million won annually, but will not be held accountable for their results. The aim is to place value on failure and trial and error.
SNU held the “2026 SNU Grand Quest Forum” at its Gwanak campus Wednesday, where it announced six projects to chart future research directions. The SNU Grand Quest is an initiative to identify questions that can bring change to society and to encourage innovative research, which SNU has been pursuing in earnest since this year.
The initiative began from a recognition that stable research alone poses limits to a university’s development. In his opening address that day, SNU President Yoo Hong-lim stressed, “SNU and our nation, standing at the pinnacle of catching up, can no longer guarantee growth with the strategies of the past.” He added, “Universities must be reborn from institutions that teach answers into institutions that create questions.”
Seoul National University President Yoo Hong-lim delivers the opening address at the “Grand Quest Forum” held at SNU’s Gwanak campus on the 18th. Photo courtesy of Seoul National University
Accordingly, the “SNU Grand Quest Initiative” was launched in March this year. Eighteen SNU professors representing the fields of humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, engineering, medicine and the arts selected the six projects through a two-night, three-day retreat. They are: whether democracy and capitalism are sustainable in the AI era; whether AI can forget like humans; whether AI can recover from damage on its own; whether the clock of life can be controlled; whether the will to live can be explained at the molecular level; and whether energy systems can find balance autonomously.
The key criterion for selecting the projects was “questions with no answers.” Lee Jung-dong, head of the SNU Grand Quest, explained, “We picked challenges that can dismantle textbook conventions and create independent research areas or disciplines different from the existing ones.” As the scope of the questions widened, a variety of ideas poured in. A total of 2,143 questions were submitted to the Grand Quest contest, which SNU held for a month targeting undergraduate and graduate students and faculty.
The six questions were designed to span all fields, from humanities and social sciences to engineering. For example, the question of whether democracy and capitalism are sustainable in the AI era requires collaboration across multiple disciplines such as economics, political science and engineering, as it must comprehensively examine the impact on existing institutions and technological advances. In the Grand Quest, revising research directions or overturning existing premises is also freely permitted.
SNU plans to recruit research teams to test the six challenges starting in September, with full-scale support beginning in April next year. The teams ultimately selected will receive up to 500 million won annually for up to five years. The total budget is on the scale of 100 billion won. The research is evaluated by process rather than results. Lee said, “We will not hold teams accountable for trial and error and will support them over the long term,” adding, “We will not select predictable research.”