Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences
Tohoku University

Assistant Professor Chrystelle Bernard Wins "Best Presentation Award for Young Researcher" in ICFD2019   Assistant Professor Chrystelle Bernard, a researcher of ELyTMaX, gave an oral presentation and received "Best Presentation Award for Young Researcher" in The 16th International Conference on Flow Dynamics (ICFD2019) held in Sendai International Center during 6-8th Nov. 2019. The award-winning research was conducted as part of a research program at ELyTMaX.   Presentation title: Investigation of the Thermal Behavior of Inflight Polymer Particle during Cold-Spray Process   Award date: 3rd Dec. 2019   Conference website: http://www.ifs.tohoku.ac.jp/icfd2019/index.html Award information: http://www.ifs.tohoku.ac.jp/icfd2019/images/Best_Presentation%20Award_for_Young_Researcher.pdf ELyTMaX website: http://www.elyt-lab.com/en/content/elytmax-umi-3757  

Tomokatsu Onaga (The Effect of Concurrency on Epidemic Threshold in Time-Varying Networks) co-authored,   Title: The Effect of Concurrency on Epidemic Threshold in Time-Varying Networks Authors: Tomokatsu Onaga, James P Gleeson, Naoki Masuda Published: 2019 Book: Temporal Network Theory pp. 253-267 Publisher: Springer, Cham Print ISBN: 978-3-030-23494-2 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23495-9_14  

A scanning electrochemical cell imaging technique shows how nanoscale structural features affect the catalytic activity of MoS2 monolayers for hydrogen evolution reactions, report researchers of a joint team led by Kanazawa University in Angewandte Chemie International Edition   The properties of 2D transition metal dichalcogenides are attracting a great deal of interest, and one of the reasons is their catalytic activity. In particular, better catalysts are needed to exploit the potential of water electrolysis – splitting water into its component elements – to provide sustainable energy storage.   “MoS2 is one of the most promising precious rare metal-free catalysts for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER),” point out Yasufumi Takahashi, Mingwei Chen, and Tomokazu Matsue and their colleagues at Kanazawa University, Tohoku University and other collaborating institutions in Japan, the US and the UK in their recent Angewandte Chemie International Edition report. The work highlights the role of “scanning electrochemical cell microscopy” for engineering the catalytic properties of these 2D materials.   As the researchers point out, scanning electrochemical microscopy has already proved useful in investigations of the catalytic activity of MoS2 monolayers, which have focused on the effects of strain, as well as the metallic versus semiconducting properties of different microstructural phases of MoS2 on HER catalysis. These studies used a microscale electrode to probe the sample for electrochemical activity as a function of location with high spatial resolution, on account of the microscale dimensions of the electrode.   In their scanning electrochemical cell microscopy studies, Takahashi, Chen, Matsue and colleagues use a nanopipette as a local, moveable electrochemical cell to probe the electrochemical activity on the surface instead of an ultramicroelectrode. They highlight the “reproducible and reliable technique for fabricating nanoprobes together with fast electrochemical characterization due to its small capacitive current” as additional advantages of this form of the characterization technique.   The researchers used a nanopipette with a 20 nm radius to study triangular monolayers of MoS2 with a 1H microstructural phase, as well as heterostructures of MoS2 and WS2. Each flake had a side length of around 130 nm. The measurements revealed changes in catalytic activity where edges, terrace features and heterojunctions between MoS2 and WS2 were located, which agrees with the suggestions of previous reports. In addition, aging the sample had a noticeable effect, particularly at edges.   The researchers conclude that their study demonstrates how it is possible to evaluate the local HER activity of catalytic samples using scanning electrochemical cell microscopy. They suggest that the technique can be a “powerful tool” for engineering the phase and structure of 2D transition metal dichalcogenide samples for applications in catalysis.   [Background] 2D transition metal dichalcogenides The isolation of graphene and the extraordinary properties identified in the material attracted intense interest from researchers not only in graphene but in a whole host of other materials, where 2D layers could be isolated. Among these 2D materials are transition metal dichalcogenides where the transition metals include molybdenum (Mo) and tungsten (W) and the chalcogens are group VI elements, which include sulfur (S), selenium (Se) and tellurium (Te). As well as electrochemical catalysis for energy storage, this group of materials has also attracted interest for high-end electronics, spintronics, optoelectronics, energy harvesting, flexible electronics, DNA sequencing and personalized medicine.   [The hydrogen evolution reaction] The use of hydrogen as a fuel involves burning it in oxygen to produce just water and the release of a lot of energy. Hydrogen fuel avoids the use of fossil fuels and the production of carbon dioxide, and it can get around some of the issues of energy storage associated with many alternative sustainable energy technologies such as solar and wind power. The electrolysis of water using a sustainably sourced current provides an environmentally friendly way of producing hydrogen fuel. Although HER is faster than the oxygen evolution reaction, there is still great interest in increasing the reaction rates. As a result, there is a lot of interest in the catalytic activity of 2D transition metal dichalcogenides on HER among other reactions.   Reference: Yasufumi Takahashi, Yu Kobayashi, Ziqian Wang, Yoshikazu Ito, Masato Ota, Hiroki Ida, Akichika Kumatani, Keisuke Miyazawa, Takeshi Fujita, Hitoshi Shiku, Yuri E Korchev, Yasumitsu Miyata, Takeshi Fukuma, Mingwei Chen, Tomokazu Matsue, " High Resolution Electrochemical Mapping of Hydrogen Evolution Reaction on Transition Metal Dichalcogenide Nanosheets", Angewandte Chemie International Edition DOI: 10.1002/anie.201912863 https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.201912863     Figure 1. [TOC image] Scanning electrochemical cell microscopy (SECCM) allows imaging and quantitative analysis of hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) catalytically active sites in 1H MoS2 monolayers.  

Assistant professor Fumihiro Kaneda at FRIS, Tohoku University and Professor Paul Kwiat at University of Illinois have built the world’s most efficient single-photon source.   A single photon, a smallest unit of light, is a proposed resource in quantum computation and communication, serving as a quantum bit, or qubit. To produce photons quantum optics researchers often used nonlinear-optics effect where one of billions of photons in a laser pulse is split into a pair of low-energy photons. However, this photon-pair production is probabilistic; it can produce nothing (typically with over 90% probability), one pair, or two pairs. Kaneda and Kwiat solved this low-efficiency problem using a technique called time multiplexing. Their technique also uses a nonlinear-optics source but photons produced at random times are adaptively delayed via quantum memory so that produced photons are temporally multiplexed to enhance the presence probability of a single photon at the fixed time.   They are still improving the multiplexed single-photon source. Their planned upgrades would enable to produce 30 to 50 single photons simultaneously at unprecedented efficiencies. Although this is much smaller than the number of bits handled in an ordinary computer, quantum computation with such a small number of qubits could be comparable or faster than a supercomputer for some types of computations.   The researchers’ current findings were published online in Science Advances on October 4, 2019.   Publication Detail: F. Kaneda, P. G. Kwiat, "High-efficiency single-photon generation via large-scale active time multiplexing", Science Advances, Vol. 5, eaaw8586 (2019) DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aaw8586

Jellyfish are animals that possess the unique ability to regenerate body parts. A team of Japanese scientists has now revealed the cellular mechanisms that give jellyfish these remarkable "superpowers." Their findings were published on August 26, 2019 in PeerJ. "Currently our knowledge of biology is quite limited because most studies have been performed using so-called model animals like mice, flies, worms and fish etc. Given that millions of species exist on the earth, it is important to study various animals and broaden our knowledge," said Yuichiro Nakajima, Assistant Professor at the Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences, Tohoku University in Japan, and corresponding author of the study. "Jellyfish are one of such animals with interesting biological features," Nakajima said. "For example, they have stinging cells, called cnidocytes, to capture prey." Cnidarian jellyfish - named for their stinging cells - have existed on the earth for more than 500 million years. They form part of a unique group of animals that are not bilaterally symmetrical and also possess the capacity to regenerate body parts -- a trait most of the complex animals, including humans, have lost. These early-diverging primitive animals could play a pivotal role in helping us better understand the evolutionary biology of bilaterally symmetrical animals, like us humans. For their study, the researchers used Cladonema pacificum -- a jellyfish species from the Cnidaria phylum that has branching tentacles -- to investigate the spatial pattern of cell proliferation and their roles during jellyfish development and regeneration, aiming to establish the cellular basis of these phenomena. "With easy lab maintenance and a high spawning rate, Cladonema is suitable for studying various aspects of jellyfish biology," Nakajima explained. Cladonema jellyfish have branched tentacles ⒸSosuke Fujita, Tohoku University   To investigate the role of cell proliferation following food uptake in determining body-size growth, appendage shape, and regeneration in Cladonema jellyfish, the researchers examined the distribution of cells that play a key role in DNA replication through cell division, producing new 'daughter' cells that are identical to the original 'parent' cell. They found spatially distinct groups of proliferating cells in the medusa (sexual) life-stage, with cell proliferation in the umbrella-shaped portion of their body being uniform, while cell proliferation in the tentacles was clustered. After withholding food or blocking cell proliferation using a cell-cycle inhibiting agent, the researchers found body size growth was inhibited, and they also observed defects in tentacle branching, differentiation of stem cells into stinging cells, and regeneration. These results suggest that free-swimming adult jellyfish in the sexual stage possess actively proliferating cells that play a key role in controlling body-size, tentacle shape, and regeneration. Additionally, the researchers found that when food was not available, the jellyfish exhibited a gradual decrease in body size after 24 hours, suggesting they are sensitive to food availability and are able to adapt to metabolic changes in response to environmental conditions. Cladonema polyp give rise to jellyfish ⒸSosuke Fujita, Tohoku University "We are currently trying to understand the molecular mechanisms of Cladonema development and regeneration," said Sosuke Fujita, a master student in the Graduate School of Life Sciences, Tohoku University, and the first author of the study. "Based on this research, molecular control of cell proliferation is the key to deciphering jellyfish growth and regeneration. According to Nakajima, the researchers also plan to investigate the differences between the two different adult stages in jellyfish: medusae (sexual) and polyps (asexual). "For these purposes, we will identify gene expression changes associated with different developmental and regeneration contexts and plan to introduce genetic tools for manipulation of genes." The study by Nakajima's group got a lot of attention from foreign media and was highlighted by several worldwide news. https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-10/tu-jg092919.php https://www.alphagalileo.org/en-gb/Item-Display/ItemId/184335 https://www.asiaresearchnews.com/content/jellyfishs-superpowers-gained-through-cellular-mechanism https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/offbeat/scientists-unravel-mystery-of-the-jellyfishs-superpower-ability-to-regenerate-body-parts/ar-AAI7v0I http://transition.meltwater.com/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.sciencedaily.com%2Freleases%2F2019%2F10%2F191001102205.htm&transitionToken=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzUxMiJ9.eyJob3N0bmFtZSI6Ind3dy5zY2llbmNlZGFpbHkuY29tIn0.Ki_MhVIfMfUk7falEvFecn0pLyO2IbwTRz0pkC5PQ1uOxwTzEl1gaKsfWOGSIrAp9s_bATcjZQWi29WHH6Kuzg https://www.siliconrepublic.com/innovation/jellyfish-superpower-limb-regeneration   Publication Details: Title: Cell proliferation controls body size growth, tentacle morphogenesis, and regeneration in hydrozoan jellyfish Cladonema pacificum. Authors: Sosuke Fujita, Erina Kuranaga, Yu-ichiro Nakajima Journal: PeerJ, 7:e7579, 2019.　 DOI: 10.7717/peerj.7579         #s3gt_translate_tooltip_mini { display: none !important; }

As robots become more and more ubiquitous in human society, the study of their emergence becomes critical to assessing robot performance and appropriateness for different applications, and for employment across countries with different cultural backgrounds. Throughout history, religion has been a major element in all human cultures, and there is a long history of religious commentary on the idea of automation. With emerging robotic platforms and applications already beginning to touch on the subject of religion, now is the right time to begin discussing this potentially controversial topic.   Assistant Professor Weng Yueh-Hsuan and his co-authors published new article in " International Journal of Social Robotics" on 25th September 2019. The objective of this article is to analyze what impacts Taoist religion may have on the use of Ethically Aligned Design in future human–robot interaction.   Publication： Yueh-Hsuan Weng, Yasuhisa Hirata, Osamu Sakura, Yusuke Sugahara, "The Religious Impacts of Taoism on Ethically Aligned Design in HRI", International Journal of Social Robotics, 2019 DOI: 10.1007/s12369-019-00594-z https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12369-019-00594-z

Tetrodotoxin (TTX), one of the most famous toxin, is distributed worldwide in marine and terrestrial animals such as pufferfish, snails, newts and frogs. Its complex chemical structure and potent toxicity has been fascinating scientists in various research fields for a long time. Despite the intense interest in TTX, a question “How this unique toxin is biosynthesized in nature?” has not been resolved. Since the true producer of TTX is ambiguous, the genetic information regarding biosynthesis of TTX is not available at all. Dr. Yuta Kudo, Assistant Professor of Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences, and Dr. Mari Yotsu-Yamashita, Professor of Graduate School of Agricultural Science, discovered two new natural compounds related to tetrodotoxin from toxic newt. The biosynthetic pathway of TTX in terrestrial environments was proposed/discussed based the structures of new compounds and the series of putative biosynthetic intermediates of TTX collected by them in previous studies. In addition, the voltage-gated sodium ion channel blocking activity of new compound was evaluated by cell-based assay, and the value was compared with TTX and its known analog. These results may shed light on a mystery of biosynthesis of TTX and proceed the structure-activity relationship study of TTX. The article reporting these results published in “Journal of Natural Products” as ASAP on May 22, 2019.    Publication Details Yuta Kudo and Mari Yotsu-Yamashita* (*corresponding author)  "Isolation and Biological Activity of 8-Epitetrodotoxin and the Structure of a Possible Biosynthetic Shunt Product of Tetrodotoxin, Cep-226A, from the Newt Cynops ensicauda popei" Journal of Natural Products doi: 10.1021/acs.jnatprod.9b00178 LINK； https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jnatprod.9b00178  

Number of position and job 14 Assistant Professors Organization and Department Creative Interdisciplinary Research Division, Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences (FRIS), Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan Research field ６ Research categories（1. Material and Energy, 2. Life and Environment, 3. Information and System, 4. Device and Technology, 5. Human and Society, 6. Advanced Basic Science）. Applicants are required to promote interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary sciences. Supporting conditions 2.5 million JPY (maximum) per year, which is changed by the personal evaluation in every year. Required qualification PhD degree Starting Date January 1 or April 1, 2020 (subject to negotiation) Term 3 years (with possibility of an one-time reappointment for 2 years through the personal evaluation) According to the Tohoku University’s policy, departments and/or institutes in Tohoku University consider the possibility to employ assistant professors of FRIS with excellent activities at the ends of the terms as associate professors. Treatment An annual salary and allowance will be provided in accordance with Tohoku University Remarks Applicants can select the 3 research categories at most in the proposal. Applicants are preferably requested to select the professor (or associate professor) in Tohoku University as your mentor. If you cannot get the approval, maximum 3 professors or associate professors in Tohoku University can be applied as the candidates. Application deadline Applications should arrive by August 1,2019 Requested documents (1) Curriculum Vitae (Resume using our provided format and a list of research activities such as publications and presentations etc.) Please be sure to include your photograph, current postal and e-mail addresses, and your phone number in the resume. (2) Brief statement detailing your research results (3) Proposal in our provided format (4) Approximately two academic references with e-mail addresses (5) A copy of fewer than 5 papers showing your research results (6) A copy of certification of a candidate of 2019 Leading Initiative for Excellent Young Researchers (LEADER), MEXT, Japan when you have been selected. (If not, it is not necessary.) (All documents should be prepared in A4 or Letter size format.) Application Office of FRIS, Tohoku University 6-3, Aoba, Aramaki, Aoba-ku, Sendai 980-8578, Japan (Application should be sent by (International) delivery services such as post, EMS, FedEx, DHL, UPS etc. as documents (hard copy) with a description of "Assistant Professor position application". Electric data sent by E-mail or in recording media such as CD-ROM, USB memory etc. are NOT acceptable.) Recruiting advertisement Curriculum Vitae Proposal More information at Professor, Managing and Planning Division, Junji Saida E-mail：@

  Astronomers Capture First Image of a Black Hole — Kenji Toma of FRIS contributed to paradigm-shifting observations of the gargantuan black hole at the heart of distant galaxy Messier 87 The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) — a planet-scale array of eight ground-based radio telescopes forged through international collaboration — was designed to capture images of a black hole. On April 10th, 2019, in coordinated press conferences across the globe, EHT researchers reveal that they have succeeded, unveiling the first direct visual evidence of a supermassive black hole and its shadow. This is a strong evidence for the validity of Einstein’s general theory of relativity and the existence of a supermassive black hole in the center of a galaxy. This breakthrough was announced on April 10th, 2019, in a series of six papers published in a special issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters. For more details, refer to: https://eventhorizontelescope.org/   The EHT collaboration involves more than 200 researchers from Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America. The international collaboration is working to capture the most detailed black hole images ever by creating a virtual Earth-sized telescope. Supported by considerable international investment, the EHT links existing telescopes using novel systems — creating a fundamentally new instrument with the highest angular resolving power that has yet been achieved.   Japanese researchers contributed to various aspects of this research. ALMA, operated through international collaboration between East Asia, Europe, and North America, is the most sensitive element in the EHT Array and greatly enhanced the array sensitivity. The National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) developed the data transmission instrument for ALMA to deliver the massive data taken with the array to its base facility. Japan, together with Asian partners, established the East Asian Observatory, which operates the James Clark Maxwell Telescope at Maunakea, Hawai`i.   "We also contributed in software," said Mareki Honma, Professor and Director of NAOJ Mizusawa VLBI Observatory. "We adopted a novel method called ‘sparse modeling’ in the imaging software. It enabled us to obtain a reliable image from the limited data. The EHT collaboration established four independent teams for imaging and the teams employed three different methods to generate the final images. In the end, we confirmed that all the teams obtained nearly identical images of the black hole."   "We also contributed in theory,” said Kenji Toma, Associate Professor of Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences in Tohoku University. "The EHT collaboration theory team, including several Japanese researchers and me, constructed a large library of models based on Einstein’s general theory of relativity as well as plasma physics. We compared the observed data with this library and confirmed that the observed ring image is consistent with expectations for the shadow of a spinning black hole as predicted by general theory of relativity. M87 has a powerful jet, for which the Japanese researchers have long been developing theoretical model. This knowledge was very helpful for constraining the models for the observed ring image."       The first image of the shadow of the black hole in the center of M87 taken with EHT. The size of the ring is only about 40 microarcseconds across — equivalent to measuring the diameter of a baseball on the surface of the moon from the Earth. (Credit: EHT Collaboration)     Publication Details: The Astrophysical Journal Letters - First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results I: The Shadow of the Supermassive Black Hole （DOI: https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab0ec7） - First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results II: Array and Instrumentation  (DOI: https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab0c96) - First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results III: Data Processing and Calibration  (DOI: https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab0c57) - First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results IV: Imaging the Central Supermassive Black Hole  (DOI: http://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab0e85) - First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results V: Physical Origin of the Asymmetric Ring  (DOI: https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab0f43) - First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results VI: The Shadow and Mass of the Central Black Hole  (DOI: https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab1141)  

Deadline : April 19, 2019   Outline One of the objectives of Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences (FRIS) is adoption and promotion for basic research themes beyond the typical disciplines. FRIS has basic experiment facilities and devices to meet the demand of interdisciplinary studies.   We invite proposals for interdisciplinary themes and subjects in order to support the seminal studies of 6 domains of (1) Materials and Energy, (2) Life and Environmental science, (3) Information and Systems, (4) Device technology, (5) Human and Society, (6) Advanced basic science for “FRIS Creative Interdisciplinary Research Program”. Adopted themes for this program are supposed to be leading to developed program "FRIS Support Program for Interdisciplinary Research" in future. Submitted proposals are to be reviewed by FRIS committee. We encourage application from young researchers such as assistant prof., lecturer, associate prof..   We appreciate your application based on new original ideas and new points of view.   Research budget 1,000,000 yen for each fiscal year.   Qualification requirements Principal researcher (Research representative) should be a member of Tohoku University as assistant professor, lecturer and associate professor. Especially, we encourage application from young researchers. Application form and submission method Applicants should fill in the application form (A4 2 pages) and follow directions. Submit 2 hard-copies to administvative office of FRIS.  Deadline April 19, 2019   For details please see the application guidelines.   Guidelines（PDF） Application（word） Contact Prof. Saida, (call extension 92-5752 or e-mail to @ ) Specially assigned associate professor Suzuki, (call extension 92-4353 or e-mail to @).