Members

Akira Iguchi

Group Leader

Research interests: He aims to clarify in detail the wide variety of phenomena generated by interactions between organisms and environments, and to derive new discoveries and applications by viewing these processes across multiple levels. His research focuses mainly on the formation and maintenance mechanisms of biological communities and populations, environmental response mechanisms, and the conservation and utilisation of biological resources.

Expertise: Molecular ecology

External links: Personal website; researchmap; Google Scholar

Atsushi Suzuki

Career Researcher

Research interests: Using biogeochemical approaches, he conducts research on environmental impact assessment related to seafloor resource development, carbon-cycle mechanisms in coral reefs and the open ocean, palaeoceanographic changes based on deep-sea sediments, and reconstruction of climate and ocean variability over the past several centuries using coral skeletons.

Expertise: Biogeochemistry, paleoenvironmentology, geology

External links: researchmap; Web of Science

Masayuki Nagao

Senior Researcher

Research interests: He conducts research on environmental diagnosis and assessment of coastal, deep-sea, and inland-water environments based on physical environmental monitoring. His topics include seafloor exploration using ultrasound, environmental diagnosis and restoration technologies for marine areas, long-term warming trends in dam-lake water temperature, and environmental impact assessment for seafloor mineral resource development.

Expertise: Physical oceanography, environmental hydraulics, coastal engineering

External links: Personal website; researchmap

Kyoko Yamaoka

Senior Researcher

Research interests: She develops environmental impact assessment methods for the development of seabed mineral resources such as seafloor hydrothermal deposits and cobalt-rich crusts. In particular, she studies the behaviour of heavy metals in sediment-seawater-biota interactions through isotope analysis and chemical-speciation analysis to assess the effects of heavy-metal release on the marine environment.

Expertise: Geochemistry

External links: researchmap; Google Scholar

Hiroki Kise

Researcher

Research interests: Centred on the taxonomy of cnidarians, he conducts research on environmental impact assessment related to marine mineral resource development, the evolution and population genetics of marine invertebrates, and symbiotic systems widely found in marine ecosystems.

Expertise: Marine biology, molecular phylogenetics, taxonomy

External links: Personal website; researchmap; Google Scholar

Naoki Saito

Researcher

Research interests: He studies how marine environments affect ecosystems in coastal and deep-sea areas. His work includes numerical modelling of ocean currents, dispersal simulations of planktonic organisms and materials, and machine-learning-based image analysis.

Expertise: Physical oceanography, environmental hydraulics

External links: researchmap; Google Scholar

Kodai Gibu

Researcher

Research interests: With a focus on analyses using high-throughput sequencing such as metagenomics and RNA-seq, he studies biological interactions and organism-environment interactions. He aims to deepen understanding of diverse biological phenomena and to visualise habitats and human impacts through biological processes, thereby contributing to a sustainable society.

Expertise: Environmental ecology

External links: researchmap; Google Scholar

Part-time Staff

Technical Staff

Yumiko Yoshinaga
Miyuki Nishijima
Giun Yee Soong
Eri Inoue
Yasuyuki Shikamori
Seiko Takeda
Aya Yamamoto
Keiko Hirai

Research Assistants

Misato Sako
Mukuto Morita
Taiga Uchida

Invited Researcher

Yuichiro Tanaka

JSPS Research Fellow

Kenji Takata

Visiting Researchers

Mariko Hatta (Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology)
Masaru Mizuyama (Meio University)
Takehisa Yamakita (Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology)
Takefumi Yorisue (University of Hyogo)

Collaborating Researchers

Akinori Teramura (Tokai University)
Ayumi Maeda (The University of Tokyo)
Makiko Yorifuji (The University of Tokyo)
Travis Washburn (Texas A&M University)