SAKURA SCIENCE High School Program Group 2
Attending a Special Lecture by Dr. Kajita Takaaki at Saitama Prefectural Urawa Girls' Upper Secondary School
On Thursday, May 23, students from SSHP Group 2 interacted with students from Saitama Prefectural Urawa Girls' Upper Secondary School, and together with those students, they listened to a special lecture given by Dr. Kajita Takaaki, the 2015 Nobel laureate for his research on elementary particle neutrinos.
Saitama Prefectural Urawa Girls' Upper Secondary School is a high school designated as an SSH (Super Science High School) by the Ministry of Education and Science. Firstly, the students at that school and the representative students from Thailand presented in English the results of their exploratory learning in their respective scientific fields.
One of the presentations by the Saitama Prefectural Urawa Girls' Upper Secondary School students was an experiment on the effect of killing bacteria through heat, ethanol, and lemon juice, and the like, using dog manure, based on the environmental issues of sewage (from toilets, and the like) purification facing some countries such as Africa and others. international students asked specific questions such as "What is the temperature in the heat treatment?" and "Why did you use dog feces?" which attracted great interest.
In the screening of the school introduction video produced by the announcement club, the international students cheered and laughed at unique group competitions such as the centipede competition and the tire pulling competition at the school's sports festivals.
After that, the students were separated into nine groups and were allowed to experience Japanese culture and club activities. These included (1) flower arrangement; (2) tea ceremony; (3) koto; (4) Japanese dance; (5) nagauta (traditional singing); (6) noh music; (7) biology (DNA strap making); (8) chemical experiments; and (9) kendo.
In the afternoon, all school students (more than 1,000!) gathered in the school gymnasium, looking forward to Dr. Kajita Takaaki's lecture.
Dr. Kajita explained his discovery of neutrino oscillations using the Super-Kamiokande, and his attempts to observe and analyze gravitational waves in the KAGRA project, which currently serves as the leader, from his enthusiasm for archery in high school, university, and graduate school. In the Q&A session, the students asked him about his opinions on the possibility of analyzing and clarifying phenomena related to the beginning of the universe, such as "dark matter" which is still shrouded in mystery, and supernova (an explosive collapse of a star) phenomena by combining research results for neutrinos and gravitational waves. This discussion made the students feel deeper interest and higher levels.
Lastly, Professor Kajita expressed to the students the importance of working without giving up, and that particularly in Japan, there are few female researchers. He said gently, "If there are any students who are interested in taking the opportunity today, I would like them to think about moving forward in their research."
