As the world's population continues to increase, humanity will be required to use the planet's limited resources sustainably. Maintaining the sustainability of food production in particular will not be limited to supplying us with fresh, tasty food; it will play a major role in the conservation of the global environment and the reuse of bioresources. In addition, forests contain roughly 90% of terrestrial bioresources, so we need sustainable use of bioresources such as wood and molecular materials produced from forests, as well as the conservation of the biodiversity and habitat of the life within them. In this course, we shall examine sustainable resource system sciences, which have developed from a basis in agrobiology and forest resources and environmental science, from a range of new perspectives. We shall seek out ways to solve global food issues, sustainably use bioresources that include multiple functions of forests, and to help sustain forest ecosystems that are formed through a rich, diverse range of life.
Laboratories
Food Production Science
We aim to develop efficient and environmentally-friendly techniques for producing safe and high-valued food, including grains, beans, fruits, vegetables, and livestock. The techniques include those for protecting crops from insect pests and diseases. Moreover, we try to discover possibly useful functions equipped in living beings at levels of genes, cells, organs, organisms, populations, communities, and ecosystems. We take various approaches based on genetics, physiology, systematics and ecology in order to accomplish the above purposes. See for themes addressed by individual supervisor candidates the Research Outlines for the Course of Animal and Plant Sciences in the Master's Program.
Forest Resources and Environmental Science
Forests are an enormous community which covers about 30 % of land and reach up to 90% biomass in the world. Thus, forests play important roles in maintaining global environments. Simultaneously, importance is focused on forests because of producing renewable resources.
Furthermore, various ecosystem functions such as land and watershed conservations, regulating the meteorological environments and providing recreational activities are involved in forest environments. From these points, forests are indispensable to human life. For the purpose of making full use of various functions of forests as environmental and material resources, this course is intended to teach and research on comprehensive and professional theory and technology related to forests and forest production. These include such topics as ecology, botany, mycology, soil science, chemistry, physics, and information science.