The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology recently designated two Soka University projects as part of a 2009 state initiative supporting scientific and technological research conducted by private universities deemed strategically important to national development. The two Soka projects are led by Department of Bioinformatics Professor Shoko Nishihara and Professor Tatsuki Toda of the Department of Environmental Engineering for Symbiosis, with ministerial funding extended from fiscal 2009 to 2013.

Launched in 2004, Prof. Nishihara’s project aims to identify and investigate glycosylation (sugar chain) function in the brain. She believes that by shedding light on the sugar chain and its functions, new treatment for a variety of brain disorders, including Alzheimer’s Disease and other neurodegenerative ailments, can developed. She also expects research on glycosylation activity—which has been linked to neural generation and differentiation, as well as to the proper functioning and dysfunction of the brain—will spur dividends in other industries.

Prof. Toda, meanwhile, is developing an engineering solution to convert organic waste into biomass energy. Conventional waste processing methods frequently generate additional waste and require secondary treatment, and are also inefficient and labor- and energy-intensive. His project aims to eliminate organic waste at their source of origin (at manufacturing sites, for example), and recover methane gas as an energy source without release secondary waste. The use of plankton to create biomass fuel, moreover, will not compete with food production.

One of the primary goals of Toda’s project will be to enhance economic feasibility. Many believe the Soka research can be spun off as a project administered under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), the international initiative supporting projects to reduce emissions in developing countries.

The two Soka projects were also designated by the ministry in 2006 as part of a predecessor initiative to promote leading-edge research at private Japanese universities.