The International Research Center for Medical Sciences (IRCMS) was established in April 2015. The center is purely run by Kumamoto University's own funding, and its aim is to strengthen international research capabilities in life sciences, and to promote international collaborative research. We strive to be a world-class research center such as the likes of institutions supported by the World Premier International Research Center Initiative (WPI) which is operated by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). Researchers from across the globe come together at IRCMS to pursue cutting-edge medical and life sciences, in hopes of heralding ground-breaking scientific findings to the world.

IRCMS is celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2025. Currently, the center consists of 91 members, including 11 Principal Investigators (PIs), postdoctoral researchers, technicians, and graduate students, with approximately 30% of them being foreign nationals. We also put tremendous emphasis on nurturing young and prospective minds, which is why we launched the WAKAKUSU program, to shape junior PIs to be successful and independent PIs. The WAKAKUSU researchers are assigned 2 mentoring PIs each, and they learn everything they need to know about leading a research group, from laboratory management to grant applications and how to be a part of international collaborative research projects, through expert guidance from their mentors. As of April 2025, we have 3 young researchers enrolled in this program.

Our network of collaborations spreads worldwide. For example, we have collaborative agreements with world-renowned institutions such as the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, National Taiwan University, and Kazan Federal University, and by leveraging these agreements we actively engage in international joint research, exchange researchers and graduate students, and hold joint symposia. We also offer internships to international students considering enrolling in Kumamoto University's Graduate School of Medical Sciences.

A unique feature of our center is the open laboratory concept, which minimizes barriers between research groups to promote interactions between scientists from different research fields. Along with English being the primary language in IRCMS, and all of our seminars and lab meetings conducted in English, our center can guarantee an open research environment completely free of language barriers. In our center, we are all equal, and the differences of nationality, race, or one's origin matter the slightest.

Propelled by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC)'s new factories and more than 300 companies in the semiconductor business, Kumamoto is becoming a world-class hub of the semiconductor industry. To fulfill society's growing demand for semiconductor and informatics researchers, Kumamoto University established the Semiconductor and Digital Research and Education Organization in 2023, and welcomed a number of researchers in the said fields. IRCMS's research focus has been mainly on stem cell biology, cancer, genomics and epigenetics. However, we believe that interdisciplinarity plays a crucial role in advancing life sciences, therefore we pledge to strongly promote interdisciplinary collaborations with different study fields such as semiconductor research, informatics, AI and quantum science. We have no doubt that collaborating with these fields will not only elevate IRCMS as a prominent institute but also bring life to a new form of science that we have never even imagined.

1/April/2025

Kazuhito Tomizawa, Ph.D.
Director&Trustee, International Research Center for Medical Sciences
Kumamoto University