DATE2021.11.04 #Awards & Prizes

Professor Hirokazu Tsukaya received the Medal with Purple Ribbon in the fall of 2021.

Disclaimer: machine translated by DeepL which may contain errors.

Professor Hirokazu Tsukaya

Professor Hirokazu Tsukaya, Department of Biological Sciences, has been awarded the Medal with Purple Ribbon, which is given to those who have made significant achievements in the fields of academics, arts, and sports. We extend our heartfelt congratulations to him.

Professor Tsukaya has long been a world leader in research on leaf morphogenesis, and his outstanding achievements in botany include the elucidation of the basic mechanism of two-dimensional leaf growth and the evolutionary process of the diverse leaf types found in nature.

Professor Tsukaya pioneered the study of leaf morphogenesis using Arabidopsis thaliana as a model plant. He showed that leaf two-dimensional growth is regulated in four different ways, regulating cell number and cell size in each of the two directions, vertical and horizontal, and elucidated all the genes and their functions involved in each. In addition, they discovered that the spatial arrangement of cell proliferation zones is determined by the diffusion of a protein called AN3, which causes leaf planar growth, and that when the number of cells in a leaf is reduced due to genetic abnormalities, the cell size abnormally increases as if to compensate for this reduction, and clarified the regulatory mechanism. Based on this basic understanding of leaf morphogenesis in model plants, Professor Tsukaya focused on the evolutionary process of some of the more unusual leaves that are considered mysteries in the field of classical plant morphology, such as the pseudobranch of asparagus, the insectivorous leaf of the insectivorous plant Sarracenia, the unifacial leaf with only the reverse side of its leaf, and the monophylla that lives its entire life on a single leaf. monophylla, which spends its entire life in a single leaf, and so on. Furthermore, he has named 44 new plant taxa, including one new genus and 30 new species, through field research in Japan and abroad, a remarkable achievement in the field of diversity biology.

For these achievements, Professor Tsukatani has received the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Award, the Konosuke Matsushita Memorial Expo Encouragement Award, the Botanical Society of Japan Academic Award, and the Hirase Award from the Plant Morphology Society of Japan.

We would like to extend our sincere congratulations on receiving this award and wish him continued success in his future endeavors.

Cabinet Office Website
https://www8.cao.go.jp/shokun/hatsurei/r03aki.html

(Responsibility: Professor Atsushi Kawakita, Department of Biological Sciences)