JEOL LTD. INTERVIEW 13
Yoshinori Ohsumi, Ph.D.
Chairman, Ohsumi Frontier Science Foundation
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
Future of Basic Research
Yoshinori Ohsumi, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2016 for his research into "what others don't do", and JEOL Chairman Gonemon Kurihara. The two spoke on the theme of "Promoting basic science and the role of business".
Part1. Obtaining "originality and advancement", taking on challenges that others do not do
Part2. Relationship between researchers and development of scientific and measuring instruments
Part3. Attitude to make mistakes and crisis as the source of evolution
Part4. Cross-cutting Linkage Creates New Value
Part5. What is beyond the expansion of basic research
Part6. Future promotion of basic science
◆Click the Play button in box above to start the video.(6 min 30 sec)◆
For scenes in Part 3 and 4, click the link here to start the video.(7 min 19 sec)
For scenes in Part 5 and 6, click the link here to start the video.(11 min 6 sec)
Ohsumi When we discuss, "what an originality is". I think it is not that difficult, but it is the spirit to "do what others don't do".
I don't mean that "it isn't good to not try new things", but I think it is important to retrieve the spirit to "try things that others don't do".
"Is it ok to do something others don't do?" This is a question among young generations.
They say, "What!?" And this is the biggest problem we have now, I believe.
Kurihara JEOL used to say what is important is "differentiation", as we wanted to gain large market. But "differentiation" can be a never-ending game of catch. So, I started mentioning, that we "make products with high barriers to entry, monopolistic in-house product that no other company produces". We shared the same ideas with people in JEOL, and came up with such an instrument.
Ohsumi The joy for researchers is, after all, "to see a world that no one has ever seen".
We should make it important to produce something that has never existed as the outcome of a company. Otherwise, we will end up keeping competition forever.
Chairman, Ohsumi (around in 1970's) at laboratory of Prof. Yasuhiro Anraku, University of Tokyo
Kurihara Various companies tend to go to a short-sighted theme and instrument of 2-3 years.
Above all, now, China has strong power. With less expensive labor, they push into it. Then, no Japanese company can win. Rather, a niche market, and no other company can. The market size is small but monopolistic and 100% market share is assured. The ideas that you have shared and our direction may be similar, I think.
Ohsumi In the study of autophagy, when I started, there were only 20 papers in the world.
There are about 10,000 papers now. What we did was all new stuff. I am really grateful that we could enjoy ourselves doing science without being conscious of others for 10 years.
Ohsumi From a company point of view, when a company tries something new, they focus on the specifications. Then, it turns out to be an instrument of bad ease of use for researchers, in reality. When developing an instrument, I think it is important to set up a system to give feedback of what is needed by researchers, to those who develop the instrument. There is a wide-spread understanding that ease of use matters. Extremely high specification, but it does not satisfy the needs of the real world. That is often the case with Japanese manufacturing companies.
Kurihara Recently, the focus is rather on remote operation and automation, and developing software of good quality. There was a time when Nobel prize winning doctors were more likely to do it themselves in a laboratory. Rather than that, what is most important is to have the instruments used by scientists more. Now, rather than that, it is required to develop instruments that can be used by many people.
Chairman Ohsumi and Chairman Kurihara in front of first JEOL commercial electron microscope DA-1
Ohsumi When we use microscopes, it is important that we can actually see what we want to see. By understanding what the problems facing researchers are, it is possible to solve them quickly. Ideally, university researchers and cutting-edge companies should work together to sort out the problems and develop instruments.
Kurihara 15 years ago, we launched "The Business-Academia Cooperation Office by the school of Engineering at the University of Tokyo and Nihon Denshi (JEOL)".
As a fruit of this office, we succeeded in visualizing magnetic things (which are difficult to be visualized by an electron microscope) for the first time in the world, by using "Magnetic-field-free Atomic Resolution STEM(MARS).
Ohsumi The biggest issue with the Japanese scientific technology administration is the duration becoming gradually shorter and the difficulty in gaining the next fund unless you come up with the outcome. Researchers are limited to short-term goal setting and engaging in research that is useful, and easy to explain, making it difficult to find a new discovery. Especially, in the field of virus research, the funding is so difficult that the number of researchers has been decreasing. In order to solve these issues, a constant support system is inevitable.
I think that researchers at universities can gain great outcomes, by promoting a wide range of research even if they did not seem worth funding. A great peak will not appear, unless researchers do many trials to broaden the foot of a mountain every day.
Kurihara After I became the president, the Lehman Shock in 2008 happened which was a once in a century global recession, and we did not have money at JEOL.
In that situation, it was easy to make it profitable. We could have thrown away the unprofitable businesses with the employees. However, if we did that, if we threw away the seed of the flower that may bloom in 5, 10 years.... I refused to think about it, even if I died. The technology of electron beams, the beginning of our business alone was our core that I wanted to protect no matter what was said, and we have left it that way.
Ohsumi In the science field, no experiment can go well without a failure. Most of them are rather failures. So, it is important how we learn from the failures. Young researchers now truly believe that a failure will ruin their lives.
When I talk with young researchers, half of their questions are something like "How can we get back from our failures?" They do not have dreams. Their great concern is that the next research fund will not come if they fail.
Kurihara Then, there will never be a spirit emerging to try new research, even though it may or may not be something that could win a Nobel Prize.
Ohsumi I agree. If there is an emotional leeway, to try something interesting, it is then, that a really new innovation will come out of it.
Part4. Cross-cutting Linkage Creates New ValueKurihara We say "YOKOGUSHI". For example, I think it is important for people who use electron microscopes to collaborate using NMR and other equipment as well. I think it's the same with your foundation, but the basis is people-to-people communication, and we need such opportunities.
Ohsumi How deep you can talk with people in different fields will be questioned in the future, especially for Japanese, I think. In countries other than Japan, people have the opportunity to communicate with other people in various fields from when they were children. In Japan, they decide their path for the future at the age of 18 years old or so.
Once they are assigned to the laboratory they belong to, they will only cope with the laboratory members, and the human relations will become gradually more narrow.
I think it is necessary to create a system for seeing various researches close and come in contact with various people when they are at graduate school.
Kurihara Professors in laboratories are all the head of the household. So, they tend to compete and survive even by knocking down the competitors, I assume.
A cross-cutting collaboration is called "connecting". Japan has the themes for that.
The number of companies who have these themes for industries, business, including certain technologies, is the highest in the world. As we have such broad industries and technologies, connecting them cross-cuttingly will create a third value that is totally new.
Such an idea must be important, isn't it?
Ohsumi In Japanese discussions, there is often a battle between the arguments A and B and which one is right. But the beauty of discussions is that, in fact, when A and B are discussed, a conclusion of C is reached. I think it is important for young people to experience that when people from different fields get together, ideas that did not exist before spring up. Experience of something else coming out of A and B is very important.
Chairman Ohsumi and Chairman Kurihara in front of XtaLAB Synergy-ED
Kurihara JEOL and an X-ray diffraction company called RIGAKU in Akishima-shi(Tokyo), the same city as our company, released a product named "XtaLAB Synergy-ED" in collaboration.
Since RIGAKU is an X-ray company, they can observe solid structures in organic chemistry, but they need to create a certain sized crystal.
However, if a solid structure of much smaller micron order crystal can be visualized,
that is a great thing. RIGAKU did not have the technology of electron microscopy.
JEOL did not have the technology of software and detectors that RIGAKU has. That's why we decided to work together. Then, a new third value came up, that was not available with either of them. I think that this kind of cross-cutting connection is important.
Ohsumi In most researches, the origin is to find some kind of principle. I also started to study autophagy with yeast. I was not certain that the research of yeast would lead to research on cancer in the future. Research is not something that can be done by one person but is done by many people in the world. What we did will be used by the next generation to open up something new, and then, it will lead to application research at some point.
My research theme of autophagy is a great concern in Europe. "How long should we keep the interval for each fasting (medical nutrition therapy) to keep good health" is a great concern in overseas countries. They ask me a lot of questions. "Is 18 hours a correct interval?"
I said, "I can't answer it." They still keep asking seriously.
Science is not something where one person can put together the whole story.
Rather, the beginning is a person who wished to elucidate a phenomenon tried hard to do so. And the achievement will be used for further development by the next generation. Something like a story that a great scientist elucidated all of it. This is not the case.
The research in the beginning is very important. Research on microorganism, or yeast. It is not possible to elucidate it all by using the yeast. The person who did the most essential conceptional study, will open up the next door in the world. This is a very important part in basic science I think.
Kurihara Instruments for analysis are called the "Mother of Science". The manufacturing industries in Japan cannot do without our instruments, so the role of our company is extremely great I believe. The basic science is small as our market, it is better if application expands. We are fortunate that we can work with the world's top scientists on a daily basis.
The top scientists use our instruments, and we utilize the technologies and human network evolving from there, and create a bigger market and expand it.
We expressed it as "evolving in the 70th year". Basic science, the beginning of our business,
that is where our DNA is. So, by engaging in that area, we will also build a bigger market.
We will do both, the roles of basic science as well as its applications.
Ohsumi We have the understanding that "science supports society". For example, people are all pleased with the event that "Hayabusa explored the asteroid Ryugu". This is not because a new research outcome helped something. As this is my case, winning a Nobel Prize made people in the entire country feel honored. This is the world to feel the science close and enjoy it. But it is different from the feeling that "it has helped". "Because we succeeded in seeing the other side of the Moon, we became affluent?". No, it is not. However, it is the feeling. We were able to see what was never known before, which is a joy.
"I am hoping that people in this country will value having the emotional capacity to "enjoy the expansion of scientific knowledge in order for human beings to become affluent."
Kurihara Most people will never know the details. I also bought a book of "Science" and read it in a hurry to learn about the "Autophagy" of you. I did not understand it immediately.
However, giving an impact to the world with technology or science that was born in Japan.
This has the meaning of encouraging people's minds very much.
Ohsumi We do not go to music concerts on the basis of usefulness, as is the case with watching sports or appreciating the arts. Japan may be a little lacking in having a sense of social presence in science as something that cannot be measured simply in terms of usefulness.
Kurihara Let's say pride of Japan. Having that kind of feeling will make the entire Japanese population energetic and the whole world will move in a better direction, then there is the meaning of science I think. If only we do for the sake of our own advantage... it is the same with a company.
10 years ago, I did not throw away the business not because I forecasted the active market of semiconductors now. However, I did not want to throw away the DNA of electron beam technologies which was the beginning of our business, even if I died. We have come with that single minded focus. I think that such passion is important, isn't it?
Ohsumi Of course, scientists need to make efforts. Efforts to make people feel science close
should be done by us, too. At the time of the Nobel Prize award ceremony, when I walked around in Stockholm, I was spoken to by some local people, "The TV program that you were on was amazing!". As such, I strongly felt that the Nobel Prize is so well known among the citizens of Stockholm. Japanese people tend to have a festive fuss only. But the fun of science should be expanded among people steadily by taking more time.
Dr. Ohsumi at Nobel Prize Award ceremony
A scene from Nobel Prize Award ceremony
Kurihara Your Science Foundation is funding those who are engaged in interesting research.
I hope that this kind of momentum will grow from various sources.
Ohsumi One small foundation cannot change it alone. I think it is very important that such momentum grows.
Part6. Future promotion of basic scienceOhsumi As it is already a matter of fact, the inside of a cell was seen because there was an electron microscope. This history is the history of technical development and advancement.
I truly believe that it is very important that a global top company exists in such area in Japan.
Since the competition is harsh, the companies withdrawing have increased.
But I am very proud that there are several companies who have their own characteristics in Japan. I don't think that the larger a company is, the better. My wish is for companies to be characteristic.
Kurihara Our company can manufacture instruments that can measure things only. Extremely speaking, the manufacturing industry would not be possible without our instruments. So, I believe that we have a great deal of responsibility for that. We have also been cooperating with you, although to a small extent, because we are very much in tune with your way of thinking.
In order to make Japan strong, it is the science that should matter.
We aim to contribute to the development of science and technology not only in Japan, but also in the world. This is the first original philosophy of the founder. Therefore, we would like to continue fulfilling such responsibility in the future.
Yoshinori Ohsumi, Ph.D.
Chairman, Ohsumi Frontier Science Foundation
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
Born in Fukuoka Prefecture in 1945, he graduated from Fukuoka Prefectural High School and entered the University of Tokyo in 1963. At the University, he specialized in molecular biology under Professor Imahori and obtained a Doctor of Science degree from the University. He then studied under Professor Edelman at Rockefeller University in the USA in 1974, returning to Japan in 1977.
After returning to Japan, he conducted research on vacuoles at the Faculty of Science, University of Tokyo, and started research on autophagy at the Faculty of Liberal Arts in 1988, and continued his research at the Institute for Basic Biology in 1996 and Tokyo Institute of Technology in 2009. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2016 for his contribution to elucidating the mechanism of autophagy.
He continues his research and established the Ohsumi Frontier Science Foundation in 2017 as its President, striving for the development of basic science.
Posted: May 2024
LinksExternal website : Ohsumi Frontier Science Foundation
Product information : Electron Diffractometer XtaLAB Synergy-ED
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Jeol Ltd. published this content on 30 May 2024 and is solely responsible for the information contained therein. Distributed by Public, unedited and unaltered, on 30 May 2024 04:13:03 UTC.
