Captivated by astrophysics, she switched from liberal arts to science. Exploring the truth of a distant galaxy, over 47 million light-years away.

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Graduate of Shinagawa Joshi Gakuin (Senior High School Division), a private high school in Tokyo

A single science magazine sparked a longing to study the universe. While dedicated to her club activities, she overcame her aversion to science subjects to pursue a path in science, eventually entering the Keio University Faculty of Science and Technology. She laughs as she says she has followed her interests and chosen paths she finds enjoyable, and now spends her days receiving observational data from an observatory in Chile on the other side of the world, approaching the distant galaxy NGC 1068. The driving force that turned her aspirations into reality was her innate curiosity and ability to take action. We asked her about her university life balancing club activities and academics, and the joys of her research life, which is always connected to a galaxy 47 million light-years away.

[*] Academic year as of the time of the interview (November 2020).

My days were consumed by gymnastics, a club activity I started in junior high school. Many people may be familiar with men's gymnastics from the Olympics, but women's gymnastics is a similar sport where we perform routines using apparatuses like the balance beam and uneven bars, competing on the difficulty and beauty of our skills. So, my high school life was full of back handsprings and somersaults (laughs). Since it's a sport you do with just your body, I found it interesting that the number of skills I could do increased in proportion to my practice, strength training, and effort. My life revolved around club activities, with morning practice, evening practice, and Saturday practice. As for my studies, I knew that if my grades were poor, it would be blamed on my club activities, so I was determined to balance academics and athletics to keep doing my best in gymnastics. That said, since I spent so much time on my club, it was a race against time. I studied diligently, making sure not to waste any spare moments, like the five or ten minutes between practices or during class breaks.

Actually, I used to feel weak in math and physics and leaned toward the liberal arts. What changed my mind was my interest in astrophysics. In my junior high school library, I happened to pick up a science magazine and saw articles on "black holes" and "parallel worlds." The topics that stirred my curiosity were described with romantic prose and beautiful visuals. As I immersed myself in reading, I gradually began to want to properly understand and know what was written in the articles. Cosmic phenomena are just full of mysteries. Then, I started to wonder, how do they even study things happening so far away? A desire welled up in me to know about the events happening in the universe and the research process behind them. Choosing a liberal arts path was still a tempting option, but at the end of my first year of high school, I chose the science track.

For me, it was "repetition and accumulation." I repeatedly solved practice problems and past exam questions within a set time to master the patterns of my target university. It may not sound smart, but I'm the type of person who believes things will work out if I just do them, and surprisingly, they did (laughs). For example, the entrance exam for the Keio University Faculty of Science and Technology requires both physics and chemistry, but once I got a grasp of the trends, it no longer felt overwhelming. I think motivation is crucial for continuing to study, so it's best to have a big future goal and the small steps to achieve it... but it's also true that it can be hard to be so sure about what you want to do before entering university. I myself wanted to study astrophysics, but I also wavered, thinking that biology and information science fields also seemed interesting.

What I found appealing about Keio University was its educational system that responds to such indecisiveness and expands students' potential. The Faculty of Science and Technology has a unique "Gakumon system[*]," where first-year students study a wide range of science fields before choosing their specialty, making it easier to consider one's aptitude and desired direction. In the end, I chose to specialize in astrophysics, which had been in my heart from the beginning, but because I was able to experience and compare a wide range of fields, the outline of the field I wanted to study became clearer, and I was able to decide on my specialty.

[*] Gakumon system: A unique system at the Keio University Faculty of Science and Technology where students select one of five "Gakumon" (academic fields) at the time of admission. After entering the university, they gradually narrow down their field of interest while studying a wide range of subjects, and decide on their department affiliation upon advancing to their second year. Note that the Gakumon system was revised for students entering the Faculty of Science and Technology in the 2020 academic year, and some of the departments that can be chosen from each Gakumon have changed. Please refer to the link below for details on the Gakumon system.

I had an image of the university as a whole being full of glamorous people, while I imagined the Faculty of Science and Technology would be full of serious, studious people. My impression of the Faculty of Science and Technology didn't change much after I enrolled, but what was added to that was the image of interesting people. It's true that they are serious and studious, but their focus isn't limited to just studying. There's a wide variety of people, from unique individuals who name and dote on the system programs they've built (laughs), to those dedicated to club activities, and those engrossed in part-time jobs related to their future careers. I felt that many people were not bound by convention or swayed by others, but pursued their own interests with a strong sense of self while also being sincere in their studies and research.

The first thing that comes to mind is the small class size. With only about 50 students per year, it's smaller than other departments, creating an environment where the distance between faculty and students is close, allowing for deep learning. Also, since there was a diverse group of people, my classmates' research fields, perspectives, and career choices were all different. That diversity made student life together interesting, and I was greatly stimulated both academically and personally.

The most interesting part of my classes was the experiments. Holography, laser light, analog circuits... all the different experiments were really fun. It was a different kind of fun from learning physics through lectures; it was the fun of being able to confirm phenomena with my own hands.

It was my club activity, the Ballroom Dance Club. It's a club for competitive ballroom dancing, and I became captivated by the coolness of the competition itself. But even more than that, the connections I made with people from other faculties were very significant. I was able to meet people who were striving to become professionals, people who seriously studied the sport, and people who always thought about the club as a whole and acted accordingly. There were so many diverse and wonderful people, and being able to spend time with them was pure happiness. I met many friends I can stay in touch with for life, and it was a precious time.

I belong to the Oka Laboratory, which studies the structure of the universe. My research field is "radio astronomy," and my research theme is "the search for peculiar molecular clouds in a distant galaxy." This distant galaxy is NGC 1068, which is 47 million light-years away from Earth. To study this faraway galaxy, I obtain observational data from observatories that use radio telescopes to observe the universe. From the numerical values in that data, I grasp the molecular structures distributed in space and, from those structures, I infer and verify the phenomena occurring in the universe. In my research, I am investigating whether molecular clouds (clumps of molecules) with characteristic physical quantities exist in NGC 1068 by observing carbon monoxide molecules, and if they do exist, what causes them. Since observing NGC 1068, which is 47 million light-years away, requires considerable equipment, I use data from an observatory in Chile.

Since we can't actually go there, data is everything in galaxy research, so I can do my research anywhere as long as I have a computer connection. I'm always staring at a computer monitor, and people might wonder what I'm doing (laughs), but my research may reveal universal principles of the cosmos that are common among different galaxies. It's a true blessing to be able to thoroughly study what I'm interested in, and I'm engrossed in my research every day.

I had the opportunity to support my seniors' research when they used the radio telescope at the Nobeyama Radio Observatory. The observatory operates the radio telescope to conduct observations according to the research plan, and I was able to stay overnight in the lab and watch the observation process online all night. I always use archived data from the observatory for my research, so that was the first time I had ever seen the actual observation work. On the computer screen were the moving radio telescope, the real-time observation work, and the acquisition of cosmic data. For me, who had entered the science track wanting to know the process of space research, it was a moment when one of my dreams came true.

Another memorable moment was when I first displayed the observation data of my target galaxy on my own computer. It was an image showing the distribution and velocity of the galaxy's molecular gas, and it felt strange, honorable, and incredibly happy to have data reflecting phenomena occurring tens of millions of light-years away right here in my hands, and to be able to analyze it myself. I will never forget that feeling.

After completing my master's program, I am thinking of finding a job at a private company. I am hoping for a job related to aviation or space, but I am just starting to gather specific information and consider my options. Without limiting my possibilities, I want to keep an open mind and cast a wide net to find a place that is at the intersection of what I want to do and can do, and what companies and society are looking for.