Bringing together the minds of five graduate students at business competition
Mon, Dec 7, 2015-
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Third year student at Graduate School of Advanced Science and Engineering
Yo Shitashima
Yo Shitashima conducts research on proteins at the Center for Advanced Biomedical Sciences (TWIns). In February of this year, he and his group won the Gold Award at the Edge Innovation Challenge Competition 2015, a business contest among graduate students sponsored by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT).
“I have long wanted to incorporate my research in business so when my advisor Professor Toru Asahi suggested I participate, I applied immediately,” says Shitashima. The theme of Shitashima’s business proposal was “better communication between working mothers and their children.” This may not sound like a particularly interesting topic for university students, but Shitashima tells us, “I thought of it as an opportunity. It was precisely because I had no experience working at a company or raising children that I could freely come up with ideas.” Shitashima’s group shared ideas based on their respective areas of expertise, ultimately devising OYAKonnect, an information service for expanding parent-child communication. The service sends working mothers a map of their child’s interests and friends based on an analysis of what they say at nursery school. OYAKonnect was awarded the competition’s top prize.
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“Now we are looking to make OYAKonnect a reality and planning to launch our own company. I would like to gain a more flexible mindset from this experience and use it in my research.” Going forward, Shitashima is dedicated to launching his new company and pursuing research activities to reach even greater heights.
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■Originally from Hiroshima, Yo Shitashima graduated from Sugamo High School. A member of the “Energy Next” Program for Leading Graduate Schools (an integrated five year doctoral course with no dinstinction between Master’s and Doctoral courses), Shitashima entered the Edge Innovation Challenge Competition 2015 together with graduate students from the University of Tokyo and the Tokyo Institute of Technology he met in the program’s student council. He assembled the team and became its leader. Shitashima is now exploring other ideas such as creating an app together with the same members of OYAKonnect. His graduate school research theme is controlling protein function via light using LOV domains. He also has a variety of personal interests including boxing and dessert making.
