[Special Feature: 10th Anniversary of the Faculty of Pharmacy] Aiming to Cultivate Drug Discovery Researchers

2018/10/05

I entered the Keio University Faculty of Pharmacy in 2008 as a member of the inaugural class. After completing my Master's program, I went on to Doctoral Programs at another university. However, this April, I was appointed as an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Pharmacy and returned once again. In this article, I would like to express my thoughts on the Keio Faculty of Pharmacy as both an alumnus and a faculty member.

The Faculty of Pharmacy consists of the Department of Pharmacy, which aims to train pharmacists, and the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, which aims to cultivate drug discovery researchers. Many private pharmaceutical universities place weight on training pharmacists, and I feel that when I entered, the Keio Faculty of Pharmacy was also focusing more on training pharmacists rather than researchers, similar to other universities. In fact, the research environment at the time was not as favorable compared to national universities. Consequently, few students went on to Doctoral Programs with the goal of becoming researchers, and many students aspiring to be researchers moved to Doctoral Programs at other universities in search of a better research environment. I myself was enrolled in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences. I didn't intend to become a researcher from the start, but as I progressed with my research, it became enjoyable, and I began to consider advancing to Doctoral Programs.

At that time, under the guidance of Professor Etsuomi Tamura, I was researching the theme of "Obesity prevention effects of coffee components." During my Master's program, I discovered that coffee components suppress fat accumulation, and I planned to clarify the molecular mechanism in Doctoral Programs. To understand the molecular mechanism, identifying the active ingredients was essential. However, since the Faculty of Pharmacy did not have the analytical equipment to achieve this at the time, it was difficult to proceed further with the research there, and I ultimately ended up moving to Doctoral Programs at another university.

Five years have passed since then, and now that I have returned to the Keio Faculty of Pharmacy, I feel that the research environment has improved dramatically compared to back then. State-of-the-art experimental equipment that did not exist then has been installed, and the mouse breeding space has been expanded. At the beginning of this year, the Drug Discovery Research Center was opened, equipped with multiple cutting-edge analytical instruments, making it possible to conduct the kind of research I had to give up on during my student days right here at the Faculty of Pharmacy.

I believe that the Faculty of Pharmacy's acquisition of such extensive research facilities is a declaration of its serious commitment to cultivating drug discovery researchers, rivaling national universities such as the University of Tokyo and Kyoto University. As a faculty member, I want to not only enjoy this blessed research environment but also contribute to the development of the Keio Faculty of Pharmacy as a research institution and to the cultivation of drug discovery researchers who will represent Japan.