An Interview with Prof. Takashiro Akitsu
Recent Progress in Science and Engineering Editorial Office 
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LIDSEN Publishing Inc., 2000 Auburn Drive, One Chagrin Highlands, Suite 200, Beachwood, OH, USA
Received: March 19, 2025 | Accepted: March 19, 2025 | Published: March 19, 2025
Recent Prog Sci Eng 2025, Volume 1, Issue 1, doi:10.21926/rpse.2501004
Recommended citation: Recent Progress in Science and Engineering Editorial Office. An Interview with Prof. Takashiro Akitsu. Recent Prog Sci Eng 2025; 1(1): 004; doi:10.21926/rpse.2501004.
© 2025 by the authors. This is an open access article distributed under the conditions of the Creative Commons by Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is correctly cited.
Prof. Dr. Takashiro Akitsu
Takashiro AKITSU has completed his PhD at the age of 28 from Osaka University and postdoctoral studies from the Institute for Protein Research, Osaka University. He worked at Keio University, Stanford University, and Tokyo University of Science and now he is a full professor of chemistry at Tokyo University of Science. Chiral Sciff base metal complexes and their hybrid systems with functional materials were the main themes of his group. He has published more than 200 papers in reputed journals and has been serving as an editorial board member of repute.
1. What Is Your Main Research Area? What Got You Interested in this Research in the First Place?
Coordination chemistry, interest in quantum and bioinorganic chemistry.
Since I am interested in organic chemistry or biochemistry, I decided to study chemistry at university. But I did not like organic chemistry and I liked physical chemistry in university. When I read inorganic chemistry text, ligand field theory and bioinorganic chemistry were attractive for me. Thus, I selected the inorganic chemistry laboratory.
When I was in graduate school, I belonged to the coordination chemistry laboratory to study synthesis, crystal structure analysis, and spectroscopy. To interpret spectroscopic data, I must study quantum chemistry. After getting PhD degree, I moved to the protein crystallography laboratory where they study metalloproteins containing copper and iron active sites.
2. What Impressed You Most in Your Research Life?
Synthesis and crystal structure analysis of metal complexes, and experiments and computation of X-ray crystallography.
3. Where Are Your Sources of Information? Where Do You Get the Latest News about Your Research Area or Where Do You Take Inspiration From?
Journals, conferences.
4. Considering the Progress in Your Research Area, Could You Please Share with Us Some Hot Topics or Cutting-Edge Technologies in Your Research Field? And What Challenges and/or Developments that May Be Encountered in the Coming Years?
Hybrid materials of proteins and metal complexes. Crystal structure determination may be difficult.
5. Is There a Book You’ve Read that You’d Recommend Universally (i.e., to Everyone You Meet)?
F. Basolo, R. C. Johnson, "Coordination Chemistry, 2nd ed." 1986.
In the coordination chemistry laboratory, my direct supervisor was Prof. S. Komorita. Her professor was Prof. S. Yamada who translated this book into Japanese Language. They were colleagues of Prof. R. Tsuchida who proposed "Spectrochemical Seriese". This principle is written in any texts of inorganic chemistry. After all, when I was an undergraduate student at Osaka University, I came across a book that sparked my interests and led to the selection of my research lab and field of expertise.
6. What Valuable Suggestions or Experiences Would You Like to Share with Young Scholars Regarding How to Be a Professional Researcher?
Studying fundamental aspects such as quantum physics.
7. What Is Your Long-Term Research Goal?
To establish the principle for hybrid materials of metal complexes.
8. What Are the Recent Research Trends that You, as a Scholar, Would Suggest Recent Progress in Science and Engineering to Observe and to Follow?
Emerging interdisciplinary topics.
