The powerful Typhoon, Muifa, brought very heavy rainfall and strong winds to Okinawa over a period of more than 40 hours. On Saturday, August 6, 609 mm of rain fell in 24 hours, the heaviest rainfall on Okinawa since data became available in 1981.
The OIST Welcome Club, a volunteer group of OIST employees and their family members which holds weekly language classes, welcome parties for new arrivals, potluck dinners, group excursions, and other activities to bring people together.
Unna Festival is Onna Village’s local summer festival, and this year it took place at Onna Village Community Center on July 22 and 23. Since the summer break for local schools began a few days ago, many children and parents joined the festival to spend the hottest days of the summer. OIST set a booth and displayed the scale model of the OIST campus, science posters and OIST promotional videos to teach visitors about OIST and science and technology in general. The scale model of the OIST campus attracted the interest of many children.
On July 9th, Okinawa Prefectural Assembly members, Okinawa City Goya Community Association members, and Okinawa Shogaku High School students visited OIST for a tour of campus facilities. These visits from different community groups offered a great occasion for OIST to strengthen relationships with the Okinawa community.
Dr. Takayuki Yamashita, formerly a group leader in the OIST Cellular and Molecular Synaptic Function Unit led by Dr. Tomoyuki Takahashi, will receive the 2011 Japan Neuroscience Society Young Investigator Award.
OIST has received a Good Lighting Award 2010 from the Illuminating Engineering Institute of Japan (IEIJ) for the excellent illumination facilities in Laboratory 1.
On June 29, three young students from Jr. High Schools in Onna village, Asato Shinjo from Onna Jr. High School, Hayato Adam Cooper from Nakadomari Jr. High School, and Minami Matsuo from Yamada Jr. High School, visited OIST to take part in a one-day work experience program.
Tucked away beneath the administrative offices and meeting rooms of the Center Building is a tank of over 540,000 liters of water. Every night, two huge “super-coolers” freeze this water, producing a block of ice weighing over 180 tons – more than a fully-grown blue whale.
The June 30, 2011 edition of the Okinawa Times carried an article by Dr. Jonathan Dorfan, President-elect of the OIST Graduate University, about important events that took place at OIST June 16-18.
OIST has deepened its relationship with the University of the Ryukyus through various occasions. Thirty-six members of the Department of Engineering at the University of the Ryukyus, including faculty members, visited OIST on June 23 to take a tour of the campus facilities and to exchange academic information to strengthen relationship between the Department of Engineering at the University of the Ryukyus and OIST.
High performance computing (HPC) is the foundation of OIST’s capability to carry out cutting-edge research in science and technology. On June 21, Dr. Alf Wachsmann, HPC Manager of OIST, held a seminar, "Research Computing at OIST" at the OIST campus.
