BSJ for 2025
by Mitsuyasu Hasebe, BSJ President
I am Mitsuyasu Hasebe, a member from the Chubu region, and I was elected Representative Director and President at the Board of Delegates meeting on March 2, 2025, followed by the subsequent Board of Directors meeting. I currently serve as a professor at the National Institute for Basic Biology, National Institutes of Natural Sciences, and as a professor at SOKENDAI (the Graduate University for Advanced Studies) in Okazaki City, Aichi Prefecture.
Together with General Secretary Shizuka Fuse (Kyoto University), Editorial Director Noriko Inada (Osaka Metropolitan University), Director Takashi Ueda (National Institute for Basic Biology, National Institutes of Natural Sciences), Director Junko Kyozuka (Tohoku University), Director Hirokazu Tsukaya (The University of Tokyo), Director Tomomichi Fujita (Hokkaido University), Director Sachihiro Matsunaga (The University of Tokyo), Director Satoko Yoshida (Nara Institute of Science and Technology), Accounting Director Natsu Katayama (The University of Tokyo), General Affairs Director Kenji Fukushima (National Institute of Genetics, Research Organization of Information and Systems), Auditor Toru Hisabori (The Graduate University for Advanced Studies), Auditor Misako Kato (Ochanomizu University), Accounting Assistant Yuki Hirakawa (Hiroshima University), Public Relations Committee Chair Michitaka Notaguchi (Kyoto University), and Secretariat members, including Secretary General Yoshiko Kitagawa and Office Staff Mari Aoki, we will strive to promote the Society's mission: "To promote botanical research and disseminate botanical knowledge, thereby contributing to academic development." We look forward to collaborating with all delegates and members until the Board of Delegates meeting in March 2027.
Let me introduce myself. Within the Botanical Society of Japan, I have served in various capacities, including Library Director during my tenure as an assistant professor at The University of Tokyo, Chair of the 84th Annual Meeting in Nagoya University, Executive Director, Director, and Delegate. I have also gained experience in science administration through roles such as Science Advisor at the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Council member for Science and Technology at the MEXT, Senior program officer at the Research Center for Science Systems, the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPR), and Program officer of the Strategic International Collaboration Research Program at the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST). I have also served as President of the Society of Evolutionary Studies, Japan, among other roles in various academic societies.
My passion for land plants drives my research, and my dream is to one day confidently say, "I have mostly understood the diversity and evolution of land plants." I also contribute to the societal implementation of knowledge through cultural creation. Since my student days, when my paper on the monophyly of extant gymnosperms--a molecular phylogeny inference nobody believed in at the time--was published in The Botanical Magazine, Tokyo (the predecessor of Journal of Plant Research), the Botanical Society of Japan has been indispensable to my research career. Publishing review articles in JPR has been instrumental in expanding my research from molecular phylogeny to evolutionary development, stem cell evolution, and electrical signal evolution, allowing me to pioneer new research fields. I hope to leverage my experience to further the development of the Society.
During this term, the Board of Directors, in collaboration with the Board of Delegates and Society members, will address several key issues:
1. Institutional reforms to ensure a diverse range of members from different fields can be elected as president.
2. Systematic reforms to maintain relationships between the Society and retired members.
3. Measures to enhance the effectiveness of public lectures.
4. Strategies for the stable operation of JPR.
5. The role and format of symposia hosted by the Board of Directors
6. Approaches to donations to the Society.
We will keep members updated via Society emails and welcome your candid opinions and suggestions.
This year's annual meeting is being organized under the leadership of Juntaro Negi, the conference chair from Kyushu University. Preparations are progressing smoothly for the event, scheduled to take place from September 18 to 20 in Fukuoka. We look forward to seeing you there!
The address from the previous (31th) president Ichiro Terashima
The address from the previous (30th) president Tetsuro Mimura