Hope for the Future ― RIKEN Symposium on Sustainable Resource Science ―

RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science (CSRS) held an online symposium 'Hope for the future' on May 28, 2021. The symposium aimed to establish a new field of "Sustainable Resource Science" for the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and to widely disseminate this field to society.

Since its establishment in 2013, RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science (CSRS) has been promoting research oriented towards “problem-solving” based on the concept of developing manufacturing methods with reduced environmental impact through interdisciplinary integration of plant science, chemical biology, and catalytic chemistry.

We invited two keynote speakers. Dr. Akira Yoshino who is the 2019 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry and Honorary Fellow of Asahi Kasei Corporation, and Prof. Johan Rockström, who led the concept of "Planetary Boundaries" that was the basis of the SDGs, and he is Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research / Professor, Earth System Research, University of Potsdam. They gave talks about the present and future vision of science technology, and the global trends about the climate change and the things human being should do and must do.

In the oral sessions, the leaders and deputy leaders of the RIKEN CSRS flagship projects presented an overview, achievements, and future plans or prospects. Some distinguished researchers from research institutions and universities with relevant to RIKEN CSRS gave presentations on their current research activities and future expectations for our projects. In addition, the next generation of RIKEN CSRS non-PI researchers gave presentations on their research and the future potential of research in the natural sciences and SDGs.

In the panel discussion, keynote speakers, oral session speakers, and policy maker from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) took the stage and conducted lively discussions on the themes proposed by the coordinator (Kazuki Saito, Director of RIKEN CSRS).

Through the seventeen lectures and panel discussion, we had lively discussions on society’s expectation of this new field and what our centers and researchers can and should do to make this all possible. With this symposium as a starting point, we will continue our efforts to establish a new field of "Sustainable Resource Science" from RIKEN.

　
Keynote speakers (left: Dr. Akira Yoshino, right: Prof. Johan Rockström)

Panel Discussion

　　
Greetings