RIKEN Center for Interdisciplinary Theoretical and Mathematical Sciences

Takumi Doi Receives the Awards for Science and Technology (Research Category) in the FY2026 Commendation for Science and Technology by MEXT

Takumi Doi (Senior Research Scientist, iTHEMS) has received the Awards for Science and Technology (Research Category) in the FY2026 Commendation for Science and Technology by MEXT. This award is given to researchers who have achieved outstanding research accomplishments. He was honored for his research entitled “ First-Principles Studies of Realistic Hadron Interactions and Exotic Hadrons.” Congratulations, Takumi!

2026-04-30

Farewell message from Iao-Fai Io

Our colleague, Iao-Fai Io, will be returning to National Taiwan University starting in May to complete his Ph.D. We will miss him and wish him all the best in his future career. Here is a message from Iao-Fai: <i>I joined iTHEMS in May 2025 as an International Program Associate (IPA). Over the past year, I have been very happy to be part of the iTHEMS member.</i> <i>RIKEN is one of national research institute in Japan, during my time here I had the opportunity to attend many high-quality seminars and workshops. I have also had the opportunity to visit and interact with member from different centers in RIKEN(such as CEMS, FQSP, RQC, etc.). I am also very grateful for the “coffee meetings” and “iTHEMS Now & Next” events, which helped me understand iTHEMS and learn about research which is beyond my own field.</i> <i>I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my host researcher, Dr. Ching-Kai Chiu. He has taught me a great deal about research, particularly in superconductivity and altermagnetism, which has significantly improved my research abilities in condensed matter theory. Whenever I encountered difficulties in my research, he was always willing to discuss them with me and suggest valuable advice. I am also grateful to him for introducing me his collaborators, including Congcong Le (a former iTHEMS member) and collaborators from China. In addition, I would like to thank him for his support during my visits abroad.</i> <i>I would also like to thank Tomoko Iwanami-san and Chikako Ota-san for their administrative support. In addition, I am grateful to all the people I have met at iTHEMS over the past year (such as Yan, Xiaoyang, Duc-Truyen, Tianyin, Zhe, Jinyang, Rumi, Yuta, Brian, Shuntaro, Lingxiao, Muzi, Sho, Satsuki, Iso, Haruki, Tada, Hatsuda, etc.).</i> <i>Over the coming year, I will return to National Taiwan University to complete my Ph.D., while also beginning to apply for postdoctoral positions. In the future, if I have the opportunity, I would be happy to visit RIKEN iTHEMS again. I sincerely hope to see you all again in the near future.</i>

2026-04-30

Ryusuke Hamazaki Receives the Young Scientists’ Award from MEXT

Ryusuke Hamazaki (RIKEN Hakubi Team Leader, Nonequilibrium Quantum Statistical Mechanics RIKEN Hakubi Research Team, RIKEN Cluster for Pioneering Research (CPR) / Senior Research Scientist, iTHEMS) has received the Young Scientists’ Award in the FY2026 Commendation for Science and Technology by MEXT. This award recognizes early-career researchers who have achieved outstanding research accomplishments. He was honored for his research entitled “Studies on universality and novel phases in nonequilibrium quantum many-body systems.” Congratulations, Ryusuke!

2026-04-27

The third RIKEN Quantum internal meeting on March 30, 2026

On Monday, March 30, the third RIKEN Quantum internal meeting was held in the Large Conference Room (2F, Administrative Headquarters) at RIKEN, Wako, attended by a total of over 50 RIKEN Quantum members and related researchers. At this meeting, Yahui Chai and Danny Jammooa, who were invited from overseas, gave presentations on their recent research, 'Quantum Simulation of Particle Scattering' and 'Parametric Matrix Models,' respectively. Furthermore, Jian Xu, who recently joined RIKEN Quantum, presented the research he plans to pursue at the institute. In addition, 12 researchers from various fields associated with RIKEN Quantum, who also serve as RIKEN TRIP visiting scientists for collaborative projects, gave short talks to introduce their work. At the banquet following the meeting, members, including those meeting for the first time, exchanged ideas in a relaxed atmosphere, leading to fruitful discussions for the further development of RIKEN Quantum. Reported by Shinichiro Fujii

2026-04-23

Keiya Hirashima received FY2025 RIKEN Research and Technology Incentive Award (RIKEN OHBU Award 理研桜舞賞)

Keiya Hirashima (Special Postdoctoral Researcher, iTHEMS) has been awarded the FY2025 RIKEN Research and Technology Incentive Award (RIKEN OHBU Award). The RIKEN OHBU Award is presented to early-career researchers and staff members at RIKEN who have demonstrated outstanding achievements in research and development, research support, or contributions to the promotion and dissemination of research outcomes, through active research activities. Hirashima was recognized for his work entitled “Establishment of galaxy simulations resolving individual stars through the integration of AI surrogate models and large-scale parallel computing.” This work integrates advanced AI surrogate modeling with large-scale parallel computation to enable high-resolution galaxy simulations that resolve individual stars, contributing to a deeper understanding of galaxy formation and evolution. Congratulations, Keiya!

2026-04-21

Masazumi Honda received FY2025 RIKEN Excellent Achievement Award (RIKEN BAIHO Award 理研梅峰賞)

Masazumi Honda (Senior Research Scientist, iTHEMS) has been awarded the FY2025 RIKEN Excellent Achievement Award (RIKEN BAIHO Award). The RIKEN BAIHO Award is presented by the President of RIKEN to individuals who have achieved original and outstanding research and development results that are expected to receive high recognition in academic communities, or who have made distinguished contributions to research support both within and outside the institute. Honda was recognized for his work entitled “Development of non-perturbative methods in quantum field theory and quantum gravity.” This work develops novel theoretical approaches to analyze strongly coupled phenomena in quantum field theory and quantum gravity, and is expected to contribute to the advancement of fundamental physics through a deeper understanding of non-perturbative dynamics. Congratulations, Masazumi!

2026-04-21

Leo Speidel, RIKEN ECL Research Unit Leader, Receives the SMBE Early-Career Excellence Award

Leo Speidel, RIKEN ECL Research Unit Leader of the Mathematical Genomics RIKEN ECL Research Unit, Division of Fundamental Mathematical Science, RIKEN iTHEMS, has been awarded the 2026 SMBE Early-Career Excellence Award on March 12, 2026. This award is presented by the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution (SMBE) to researchers who have made significant contributions to the advancement of the field through innovative research and who embody the values of the society through activities such as education and outreach. He has advanced research on genetic data analysis using mathematical approaches, providing new insights into molecular evolution and population genetics. This award recognizes his research achievements and contributions to the field. Congratulations, Leo!

2026-04-21

Ryo Sawada Receives the Young Investigator Award from the Japan Forum of Nuclear Astrophysics (UKAKUREN)

Ryo Sawada, a Special Postdoctoral Researcher at RIKEN iTHEMS, received the 2nd Young Investigator Award from the Japan Forum of Nuclear Astrophysics (UKAKUREN) on March 31, 2026. The research recognized with this award concerns the impact of cosmic-ray environments originating from past supernovae on the formation of Earth-like planets [1]. Congratulations Ryo!

2026-04-09

Akira Dohi Receives the Young Investigator Award from the Japan Forum of Nuclear Astrophysics (UKAKUREN)

Akira Dohi, a Special Postdoctoral Researcher at the RIKEN Pioneering Research Institute (PRI) and concurrently affiliated with RIKEN iTHEMS, received the 2nd Young Investigator Award from the Japan Forum of Nuclear Astrophysics (UKAKUREN) on March 31, 2026. The paper [1], recognized with this award, presents a theoretical study of clocked X-ray bursters. This work also represents the first scientific result from NinjaSat, the world’s first ultra-small general-purpose X-ray satellite, launched on November 11, 2023 under the leadership of the Tamagawa High-Energy Astrophysics Laboratory at RIKEN PRI. For further details, please refer to the press release issued by RIKEN PRI via the related link. Congratulations Akira!

2026-04-09

Observation of Regular Oscillations in Magnetization with a Quantum Computer

A research group including Senior Research Scientist Tomonori Shirakawa demonstrated that discrete time crystals and discrete time quasicrystals can be stably realized for up to 100 time steps on a 133-qubit two-dimensional lattice using IBM’s superconducting quantum computer (here, one time step corresponds to one period of the drive). This result is expected to contribute to experimental validation toward digital quantum simulation of two-dimensional nonequilibrium quantum many-body systems, which are difficult to simulate using classical computation. For further details, please refer to the related link.

2026-04-02

Black Hole Recorder at EXPO 2025: “Entangle Moment — [Quantum, Ocean, Space] × Art” Exhibition Movie, Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai

Career Opportunities at RIKEN iTHEMS: Research Administrator and Administrative Support Staff

Interview with Physicist Yuta Sekino [Part Ⅱ]

Interview with Physicist Yuta Sekino [Part Ⅰ]

Interview with Mathematician Takashi Tsuboi [Part Ⅲ]

Next-Generation Researcher Award 2024” Commemorative Interview (3): Keiya Hirashima, RIKEN iTHEMS

Next-Generation Researcher Award 2024” Commemorative Interview (3): Accelerating High-Resolution Galaxy Formation Simulations Using AI Surrogate Models (Takaya Hirashima, RIKEN iTHEMS)

Physicists’ Dialogue: Discussing Quantum Gravity and Black Holes — PART Ⅱ (in Japanese)

Physicists’ Dialogue: Discussing Quantum Gravity and Black Holes — PART Ⅰ (in Japanese)

Interview with Mathematician Taketo Sano [PART Ⅱ] (in Japanese)

Physicists’ Dialogue: Discussing Quantum Gravity and Black Holes — Digest (in Japanese)

Introduction to “Black Hole Recorder” (in Japanese)

Interview with Mathematician Taketo Sano [PART I]

A Century of Quantum Mechanics

Interview with Mathematician Takashi Tsuboi [Part Ⅱ]

Interview with Physicist Yasunori Nomura - Part Ⅳ

Interview with Physicist Yasunori Nomura - Part Ⅲ

Interview with Mathematician Takashi Tsuboi [Part Ⅰ]

Interview with Mathematician Yuto Moriwaki [Part2]

Interview with Mathematician Yuto Moriwaki [Part 1]

Interview with Mathematician Eiji Inoue [Part 2] (in Japanese)

Interview with Physicist Yasunori Nomura - Part Ⅱ

The Connection Between Mathematics and Microbial Research: From Fisheries Science to the Path of Mathematics

Contributed to the 'One Poster per Household' Project – Like the Ones You See in Science Classrooms

Interview with Dr. Misako Tatsuma, a Planetary Formation Theorist

Interview with Mathematician Eiji Inoue [Part 1]

Interview with Physicist Yasunori Nomura - Part I

Interview with Physicist Ryo Namba [Part 2]

Interview with Physicist Ryo Namba [Part 1]

Interview with Ryosuke Iritani, Mathematical Biologist [Part 1]

Theoretical Physicist Tetsuo Hatsuda Interview Vol.2: About Research and Mathematics

Theoretical Physicist Tetsuo Hatsuda Interview Vol.1: About RIKEN iTHEMS

What about climate change in actuality?

The transition to synchronization: from phase reduction to the Kuramoto model

What Are Modular Forms?

Brunn-Minkowski inequality and the Borell-Brascamp-Lieb inequality

Aspects of Quantum Resonance Revisited

Distances and Durations: Cosmology 101

Symmetries of gravity

Birational classification of algebraic varieties

Gelfand duality

Scale transformations in physics and beyond

Machine Learning for Holographic Entanglement Inequalities

Describing Quantum Phenomena with Classical Gravity

Statistical Signatures of Quantum Chaos in Non-Hermitian Systems

Computers as a Playground for Mathematics

The Free Will Theorem in Quantum Mechanics

Renormalization revisited

Renormalization: Awareness of Ignorance

Recipe for soup of quarks and gluons

A subjective view on what is a quantum effect

Mathematical aspects of the entropic uncertainty relation

Forming black holes from stars

Singularity Theorems

Resurgence: making sense out of non-convergent series

How can we use a quantum computer to study the ground state of the hydrogen molecule?

Applications and Extensions of the Nielsen-Ninomiya Theorem in Condensed Matter Physics

COVID-19: then, now, and into the future

Exploring Quantum Spacetime

Classical simulations of quantum computers

When a Cretan says all Cretans are liars

Physical and local observables in gravitational theory

Can you hear the shape of a drum?

Quantum many-body physics with cold atoms

complexity in non-unitary dynamics of photons

Physics Through the Looking Glass

A new B.O.A.T. in astrophysics

Evolution and our daily rhythms

Area law of entanglement entropy in quantum many body systems and its implication in tensor network calculation

Comparison between conventional computers and quantum computers

A glimpse of enumerative geometry

Message-passing algorithms for graphical models

Canonical form of tensor networks in one and two dimensions

The basics of topological band theory

Building something from nothing: a mathematical framework for aperiodic/amorphous sets

Planetary lightning: Current State-of-the-art and outstanding questions

Collective Power of Science ~ from the High-Energy Atmospheric Physics to our New Exploration of the Universe ~

Morse theory and Floer theory

Knot theory and topological semimetals

On Dark Matter

Odd couples of interdisciplinary research

Khovanov homology theory - an introduction to categorification by Dr. Taketo Sano on May 13, 2022

Fundamentals Fest, mini Pre-event on Science "Exploring and Bridging: The Potential of Basic Science"

In Search of Pc pentaquark - Simulate Hadron Interactions with FUGAKU

AAS Journal Author Series: Hirotaka Ito on 2021ApJ…918...59I

Will Useless Knowledge Change the Future? - What is the Black Hole Recorder?

RIKEN 2019 (in Japanese)