On 5 March, Kyoto University held an award ceremony for the winners of the 18th Tachibana Award for Outstanding Women Researchers. The annual award honors the University's early-career women scholars who have made exceptional achievements.
The 2026 ceremony took place in Conference Room 1 on the fifth floor of the University Head Office and was also live-streamed.
The proceedings began with remarks from Dr Kyoko Inagaki, executive vice-president for gender equality, international affairs, and external affairs, who reflected on the selection process as the award committee chair. President Nagahiro Minato then presented a certificate and plaque to each of the two winners, one in the researcher category and the other in the student category. The researcher winner was Dr Masae Ohno, program-specific associate professor at the Kyoto University Institute for Advanced Study (KUIAS), while the student winner was Ms Kasumi Kimura, 4th-year doctoral student at the Graduate School of Asian and African Area Studies (ASAFAS). Each also received a Wacoal Prize from Ms Atsuko Shinoduka, Corporate Officer in charge of Group DX Marketing Strategy at Wacoal Holdings Corporation and Director, Corporate Officer, and Head of the Marketing Division at Wacoal Corporation.
Next, two 3rd-year doctoral students, Ms Hikari Ogoshi from the Graduate School of Engineering and Ms Alisa Tobe from the Graduate School of Science, received honorable mentions in the student category, and also accepted certificates and prizes from President Minato and Director Shinoduka.
Following this, President Minato delivered a congratulatory address, wishing all the awardees continued success in their research, before Director Shinoduka offered her congratulations.
Afterward, Dr Ohno and Ms Kimura presented their winning research to an attentive audience. Dr Ohno discussed “Elucidating gene regulatory mechanisms through the development of novel genome structure analysis technologies”, and Ms Kimura presented “Publication Bias in Colonial Kenya and its Implications for AI Training Data”.
The lively event concluded with addresses from Ms Ogoshi and Ms Tobe.
