Council of Advisors
Brain Sciences Institute-Riken
September 18-20, 2002
Introduction:
This is the fifth year in which this Council of Advisors has visited the Brain
Science Institute (BSI) at RIKEN. For many of us on the Council, this is theend of our terms as advisors. We depart with a mixture of satisfaction andexcitement. The satisfaction comes with knowing that we have been able tocontribute in a small way to the bold and visionary initiative the Japanese
government launched in 1997 when it established the BSI. The excitement
comes from realizing that Japan’s investment in BSI has begun to pay off
handsomely. In five short years, BSI has achieved international visibility andhas begun to realize its potential of becoming one of the premier brain
research institutes in the world. At the same time, it is providing a new andexciting institutional model for biological research in Japan. It has been aprivilege to be part of this magnificent initiative.
.
The goal in establishing BSI was to invest in an effort that would build andensure the future of neuroscience in Japan. The investment has paid off.
Neuroscience is a great new frontier of contemporary biology, andopportunities for progress have never been greater. The genomes of humans
and many other species have been sequenced, and remarkable experimental
opportunities are available to us through molecular biology and genetics,
systems and computational neuroscience, and brain imaging. Within decades,
we will have a far better understanding of how the brain develops, and how
it is organized and functions. These advances will aid in improving
education and in preventing, treating, and curing or alleviating brain diseases
that today affect millions of people and for which we can as yet do little
therapeutically.
BSI’s aim was to bring together outstanding neuroscientists to create acritical mass of expertise, and to expect performance that would meet thehighest international standards. Success would come as a result of the BSI

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providing its scientists with the opportunity to commit 100% of their time toresearch and supporting them with world-class facilities and ample funding.
The model would be novel, unlike any other academic institution in Japan.
The BSI also aimed to open up Japanese neuroscience to the world bywelcoming foreign scientists and students to visit and work at the Instituteand also by BSI reaching out to other countries through collaborations andpartnerships. All of these initiatives are well under way and many of them
are already successful, far beyond what was reasonable to expect five years
ago. We congratulate the Japanese government and Dr. Masao Ito for theirboldness and insight in creating the BSI. We encourage the government,
RIKEN, and BSI’s faculty, current and future, to embrace and further
develop this outstanding and unique opportunity.

Background:
In this report, the Advisory Council summarizes the observations it madeduring a three day visit to the Institute. As in previous years, we benefited
from the presentation made by Dr. Masao Ito, who reviewed the activities of
BSI since the Council’s last visit in April of 2001 and who updated us on theBSI’s progress in implementing the Council’s recommendations madeduring that visit. In addition, group Directors summarized the activities of
their groups, and one scientist from each group summarized the progress andscientific approaches of their labs. Council members also visited labs andspoke privately with BSI scientists. This format provided the Council an indepth view of the organization in a limited amount of time.

Observations:
The excellent review that Dr. Ito provided us on the progress of the BSI overthe past five years was enlightening, and supports the notion that success ishard won. Even in the best new venture, progress comes as a result of trialand error. BSI has carefully analyzed its operations and when appropriate,taken corrective action. Some information that we found especially helpful
in that report included the following:
1. BSI has established the new position of Staff Scientist, which fills theneed of retaining highly qualified and productive PhD level scientists
to work under laboratory heads beyond the initial five years. Scientists
at the Masters level also have the opportunity to work at BSI for up to2

five years while they finish their PhDs in a newly established positionof Research Associate. The Council strongly approves of these newdesignations.
2. BSI’s staff combines a good mixture of senior and junior people, withthe average age 49.2 years for laboratory heads, 35.5 years forresearch scientists, and 29.1 years for technical staff. This large
number of young people bodes well for the future of the organization.
3. The demographics of the Institute are also encouraging in that theyindicate the growing appeal of BSI as a place of employment anddiscovery. Twenty three percent of the BSI’s researchers come from
25 different foreign countries, and 35% of researchers come fromprevious positions in universities.
4. The data show that a significant percentage of researchers (mostly
post doctoral trainees) as well as technical staff have left the Instituteover the past five years. On the one hand, this turnover should beexpected as young people, after being trained, seek to begin
independent careers or permanent positions elsewhere. On the otherhand, the BSI should be careful to address employment issues thatmight lead to excessive turnover. It will be important to find thebalance between retention and healthy turnover.
5. The Council was extremely impressed with the level of international
outreach BSI has achieved. Seen as outstanding are its speaker andseminar programs, its highly successful summer program, which hasattracted students from around the world, and its cooperative
agreements and research collaborations with international institutes,companies, and universities.
6. The Council also noted that in five years, BSI scientists havepublished over 1000 research articles, many in the best journals in thefield. The number of patent applications also increased to 113 overfour years, starting from a modest 10 in 1998 to 35 in the first 8months of 2002. Both of these indices reflect the quality andimportance of the science being done at BSI.

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7. Finally, the Institute is to be congratulated for carrying out nine
external reviews in which it has asked outstanding Japanese andinternational scientists to evaluate the quality and effectiveness of its
research groups. When necessary, the Institute has taken the difficult
step of terminating programs that have not achieved the expectedlevels of excellence. This process is difficult but necessary if BSI is toachieve its promise as a world-leading neuroscience institute.
The Council made additional observations:
1. A BSI investigator was charged this year with scientific espionage. In
the view of the Committee, BSI handled this difficult problem
extremely well, minimizing damage to the reputation of BSI in theinternational community.
2. The Council was pleased with the strength and important
contributions of the Advanced Technology Development Group(ATDG), the goal of which is to expand the inventory of advanced
technologies that are available to BSI investigators. BSI has
recognized that technology can be a driving force behind good
research, and has made the investment necessary for its development.
ATDG is not a research group like others at BSI and should not beevaluated as such. Its role is to develop and provide technology tosupport BSI research and it should be recognized and evaluatedaccording to that function. In this connection, we applaud the additionof a Neuroinformatics Laboratory and strongly encourage thededication of appropriate resources to a service function to meet theneeds of other research groups.
3. The Council continues to be concerned about the focus andfunctioning of the Brainway Group and strongly agrees with andsupports the External Review Committee’s recommendation of rereview within two years to determine whether the group should becontinued.
4. The Creating the Brain Group should integrate into the experimental
biology of BSI so that meaningful and mutually beneficial interactions
can occur between experimentalists and theoreticians.

45. The Council welcomes Dr. Amari’s plan for restructuring the Creating
the Brain program, but suggests a different structure in which eachgroup integrates laboratories working on computational neuroscience,robotics and brain style computing. Cross-appointments withexperimental labs in other areas would further facilitate innovation incomputational neuroscience.
6. The Council recommends that special attention be given to the needs
for theoretical biology at the BSI. BSI should consider hiring at theGroup Director level a world-class computational neuroscientist
committed to building bridges to experimentalists throughout BSI.
Moreover, appointments made by the Director should address at alllevels modeling from the synaptic through the circuit to the systems
level
7. For a different reason, the Council is also concerned about theimaging work of the Cognitive Brain Science Group. One strength of
this group lies in technology development of fMRI and MEG, where it
is a world leader. However, the application of this technology at BSI
to important problems of brain science still needs to be developed.
8. The Council benefited from Dr. Tonegawa’s participation in our visit,
representing the RIKEN-MIT Collaboration. The science being doneby the RIKEN-MIT group is impressive, and we hope that thescientific relationship between this group and the BSI continues tostrengthen.
9. We encourage the BSI to continue and expand its interactions with thebroader neuroscience community of Japan.
10. The Council is pleased that BSI has established an office to help meetthe living needs of foreign scientists and their families. However,some faculty members feel that the office has yet to do anything
significant in helping them adjust to life in Japan. This regrettablesituation needs to be rectified quickly and the office strengthened andmade more responsive if BSI is to attract and retain top scientists fromoutside of Japan. The recommendation from the year 2001 still
remains in terms of help with tuition fees for children and support forspouses.

511. The Council noted that the quality of the scientific presentations thisyear was very much improved compared to previous years. In mostcases, the overviews of group science presented by the Directors wereexcellent as were most of the scientific presentations of groupmembers.
12.The Council learned of considerable interest growing in Japan for anational effort targeted towards life long learning, numeracy, literacy,
and understanding child development as a key step in optimizing earlychildhood education. BSI is well qualified to participate in thisprogram. The Council supports the BSI plan to contribute to thisnational effort by applying its strengths in basic neuroscience research,
for example, in nervous system and brain development. BSI groups
that study developmental neurobiology and the onset and physiologyof critical periods in brain development are especially well suited tobe major contributors to this program. This is just one example of how
the growing strength of BSI in neuroscience can contribute to Japan’snational priorities.
Conclusion: Over the five years of its existence, the Advisory Council has
been pleased to note the progressive increase in the extent and quality of thescientific and educational programs of the BSI. The potential of these efforts
to create a world-class neuroscience institute is being realized.

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