RIKEN BSI 9th ADVISORY COUNCIL REPORT
October 24-25, 2011

1OVERVIEWThe RIKEN Brain Science Institute (BSI) has made remarkable progress towards becoming one of thetop neuroscience research institutions in the world. This progress has been accelerated by a number ofkey measures instituted by the current director, Dr. Susumu Tonegawa. The advances that the Advisory
Council found particularly valuable include: a) the change in the academic structure from a morehierarchical to one where all laboratory heads are independent; b) appointments and promotions include
two levels: team leader (untenured) and senior team leader (tenured). The Council was also impressedby the progress towards recruiting and retaining the most innovative and productive researchers, therigorous review for promotion, and the strong effort towards identifying new faculty from outside BSI.
The Council found the openness with which the faculty and students discussed issues pertaining toresearch and training refreshing.
The advances made since the last review of BSI provide a fertile ground for implementing the following
suggestions for further advancing the mission of the Institute.

I. ORGANIZATIONA. Mission of the BSI
The Council views the mission of BSI as two-fold: 1) to carry out cutting edge brain research and 2) totrain the next generation of neuroscientists. It is universally recognized, by academic and research
institutes alike, that the dual missions of research and training are intertwined and inseparable.
Independent laboratories require the participation of a cadre of young enthusiastic students who canpromote the interdisciplinary nature of the enterprise, provide the engine for research, and allow forintergenerational transfer of knowledge and expertise. The defining feature of BSI is performinginterdisciplinary science. Having students that work across disciplines and laboratory boundaries
facilitates this. The nature of neuroscience in particular requires this kind of approach, opening
possibilities of combining fields such as biology, chemistry, physics, engineering, and computationalsciences. This takes advantage of the resources of RIKEN in general, which has strong expertise inchemistry and physics.
B. Improving the recognition of BSI among the international community.
As part of the effort to attract the best scientists to BSI from around the world, some measures can betaken to make the international community more aware of the attractions of the institution. One very
effective mechanism is the existing summer course offered at BSI, which is attended by an internationalgroup of faculty and students. We recommend that BSI consider instituting additional courses andmeetings to further attract postdoctoral researchers and faculty from other institutions, who can thenadvertise the BSI to their home institutions, and potentially provide candidates for recruitment in thesearch for new PIs. This has been effectively done at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory to give it alevel of recognition out of proportion to its size. The meetings and courses should be targeted at thehighest level, taught by the stars in the field, which attracts the best scientists to Japan, and by being
open to a wide variety of scientists, also exposes the junior people at BSI to the best researchers in thefield. Attendance of individuals from all levels at BSI, including students, postdocs, junior and senior2

faculty at international meetings and visits to other institutions can further promote the recognition ofthe institute among an international audience.
C. Efficiencies of operations.
Given the impending budgetary crisis in the funding of science, there are several ways in which theoperations could become more cost effective. It is generally recognized among the scientific staff thatordering is time consuming, the slowness of acquisition of needed items impedes the scientific effort,
and the costs of ordered goods are inflated beyond reasonable expectations. The BSI headquarters has
been preparing a new administrative electronic database system for the last 4-5 years, but it is not yetready. The Council encourages a swift move towards computerized ordering from an electronic databaseand directly from vendors for speed and cost-effectiveness, similar to the system used by the Universityof Tokyo. A supply system of chemicals/drugs/devices and a travel manager for business trips can beoperated using a web-based interface as a part of the administrative database.
D. Non-resident faculty.
The Council strongly recommends that BSI develop a non-resident faculty program where senior,accomplished, established investigators from an international pool spend 3-4 days every year at BSI.
The non-resident faculty will make judgments on important issues like faculty promotion andappointment. A standing group, with long-term appointments (for example, 6 years), can develop an in
depth knowledge of the BSI and a sense of the development of the institution over time. At the Salk
Institute these individuals are full-fledged faculty members who vote separately on promotions. Thishas the advantage of providing the BSI and its senior administration with independent input, free ofpotential conflicts of interest. The non-resident faculty also can provide mentoring and advice to juniorfaculty and students, and a connection with the international community.
II. INTERDISCIPLINARY TRAINING IN BRAIN RESEARCH
A. Graduate School
It is a special and particularly remarkable feature of BSI that it harbors, under one roof, the mostimportant disciplines of modern neuroscience and supports them with cutting edge technology. In thisrespect it enjoys better conditions for research than most universities and compares very favorably withother non-academic institutions devoted to basic research such as the Max Planck Institutes in Germanyor the intramural part of NIH/NIMH in the US. However, all these institutions suffer a major structuralproblem in that they cannot grant academic degrees and therefore have no direct access to PhD students.
It is well recognized that the ability to attract the best PhD students is essential for the success of
research institutions. Therefore, all leading research institutions have created PhD programs in order torecruit the best students worldwide and to harvest the creativity of young scientists. These Graduate
schools are not only a major pillar of the institutes’ scientific activity but they also contribute
substantially to the formation of the next generation of scientists and foster the reputation andinternational standing of the institution.
The Council strongly recommends that BSI makes every effort possible to found a Graduate School incooperation with universities in the Tokyo area. BSI, because of its interdisciplinary lay out and3

outstanding international reputation is an ideal place to harbor an International Graduate School and tothereby attract PhD students to Japan. Moreover, this program will be unique in Japan as there are no
integrated neuroscience graduate training programs in the Japanese universities. Given the growing
importance of neuroscience research and the impact of this field on society it is imperative thatJapan/BSI seize this opportunity of training given that it is currently one of the most popular graduate
training fields in other industrialized countries. Models of such Schools have been developed over thelast decade for most of the leading, non-academic research institutions. The International Max Planck
Research Schools (IMPRS) are a prime example and their organizational structure could be adapted very
easily to the special needs of BSI. Since their creation a decade ago, they have proven extremely
successful in catalyzing communication with universities, strengthening international ties and recruiting
the elite among the young scientists at an international level.
B. Postdoctoral Fellows
The Council thoroughly enjoyed meeting with the postdoctoral fellows and learning about theirbackgrounds and interests. The gender and international diversity of the fellows was quite impressive
and provided tangible evidence that the BSI is indeed becoming an attractive training ground forinternational scientists. The fellows are clearly great ambassadors for BSI and are a great asset forrecruiting future fellows and trainees.
The postdoctoral fellows articulated clearly that it is the quality of research and the interdisciplinary
approach to neuroscience that made BSI an attractive place for their postdoctoral training. The fellows
also indicated that they find the intellectual environment stimulating and the resources fantastic forpursuing their research goals.
When asked about issues that need to be addressed to improve the training environment and productivity,
a few items emerged and are summarized below:
1. The fellows would like to experience more scientific interactions among labs. While many ofthem find the biweekly scientific social activity quite helpful for informal discussions, theyindicated that regular seminars and journal clubs (specifically targeted for the fellows) will
permit more scientific discussions between different lab members and are likely to enhancecollaborations.
2. The postdoctoral fellows felt a need for more formal and structured mentoring activities.
Specifically, they were interested in a mentoring program that will expose them to various career
choices that include teaching, consulting, and industry in addition to the typical academic
research faculty track.
3. While the postdoctoral fellows felt they got excellent advice from their lab mentors on theirresearch project, grant and manuscript writing, many felt they can benefit from mentoring advice
on how to run and manage a lab, particularly managing finances and people.
Given these discussions and the experiences of the Council members at their home institutions, it wasagreed that the fellows at BSI would benefit tremendously from forming a postdoctoral association(PDA) that can oversee the implementation of activities that address the above issues. The PDA willorganize a seminar series in which the fellows identify and invite speakers who are role models and who4

can provide insight into various career options in science and can inspire the fellows by sharing theirown experiences, the challenges they faced and how they overcame such challenges.
In addition, the PDA will arrange inter-laboratories journal club. Also the PDA might organize meetings
in which the fellows can support each other by sharing experiences. Such activities will enhanceinteractions amongst postdoctoral fellows, will open doors for new collaborations, will facilitate transferof technologies between labs, and will make the BSI environment more attractive for international
fellows. Lastly, the interactions between PDA and scientists within and outside Japan will expose BSI
fellows to successful scientists and will enhance their chances of identifying the most suitable career
path when leaving BSI. The PDA will require an adequate budget to run the seminar series and allow forfood and refreshments at journal clubs, and for meals with invited speakers.
To take advantage of the unique interdisciplinary training environment at BSI, the postdoctoral fellows
need to interact actively with their peers in other laboratories in the BSI, and to receive input from otherinvestigators beyond his/her own laboratory. Multi-laboratory group meetings are ideal platforms forproviding such opportunities. The Council noted that along with the dissolution of the Group structure,some useful activities previously associated with the Research Group also disappeared. We suggest thatlaboratories with similar interests within the same Core or across Cores may establish mechanisms forregular interactions among their lab members, e.g., joint group meetings in which lab members of eachlaboratory have the opportunities to present their work to members of other laboratories. This will
provide the much needed opportunity for postdoctoral fellows to practice their presentation skills topeople outside his/her own laboratory, to receive advice from their peers and multiple BSI PIs, and tofoster resource sharing and collaboration among laboratories.
Given the geographical separation of BSI from the international brain research communities, the Council
noted that regular attendance at the international conferences by postdoctoral fellows is of particularimportance and should be actively encouraged by PIs and BSI administration, especially for fellows near
the end of their tenure at BSI and ready for job hunting.
III. FACULTY
The Council was very impressed with the quality of the newly recruited faculty and with the high faculty
morale. The faculty expressed appreciation for the changes in organization made by Dr. Tonegawa since
he assumed the directorship of the BSI.
While the faculty appreciate the recent changes, in discussions with them it was clear that some of thefaculty would benefit from a clearer description of these changes, especially the revised expectations forevaluation and promotion. In response to the BSI 8th advisory Council Report, the BSI leadership has
established a formal mentoring system for junior faculty. The junior faculty expressed appreciation forthis dramatically improved mentoring system. They also commented, though, that their mentors
sometimes seemed uncertain about these revised expectations. The Council recommends that more
effort be devoted to orienting both new and senior faculty regarding these changes and further changes,
however subtle, as they are implemented.

5To further improve the mentoring system and clarify faculty expectations, the Council recommends thata mid-career, less formal evaluation be provided to junior faculty 3 to 4 years after their appointments
are initiated to give them candid feedback on their areas of strength and weakness.
The Council recommends that all faculty have the opportunity to discuss the most important researchareas for the BSI, including those targeted for new faculty recruitment. With limited space and financial
resources, these will be most important decisions that ensure the BSI's future success. Enhanced faculty
involvement in these decisions will maximize faculty support for the long-term goals of the entire
institute. Periodic meeting of the entire faculty would provide one venue for ensuring that faculty havecurrent information on BSI policies and have the opportunity to participate in the major decisions of theBSI. As not all faculty will be able to be present at any single meeting, it would be helpful to record
minutes that summarize the information provided to meeting attendees and the most important points ofdiscussion.
All junior faculty expressed their strong hope of receiving tenure and continuing their careers at the BSI.
Nonetheless, the international Team Leaders expressed uncertainty about their future job prospects after
leaving the BSI. The Japanese Team Leaders also shared this concern because of a perception that it
would be difficult for them to obtain a faculty position at a Japanese university if they do not obtaintenure at the BSI. The Council recommends that BSI leadership be visibly proactive in facilitating thetransitions of faculty whose BSI appointments are ending and provides data on the successful transitionsof former faculty members. In addition to relieving stress on current BSI faculty, more proactive
policies and more comprehensive information will facilitate recruitment to BSI of the most outstanding
new junior faculty.
Family-friendly standards recently implemented in Japanese and western universities should be more
fully implemented at the BSI to facilitate the career development of all faculty with children. TheCouncil strongly urges that the BSI give faculty the option of "stopping the clock" for up to one year
after childbirth. The Council also believes that expanding the child care facilities to provide guaranteedaccess to new infants and young children would remove the stress associated with child bearing andrearing. This would clearly help young faculty advance in their careers. The Council strongly supports
the current BSI policy that provides a significant childcare subsidy to faculty. The Council believes that
this support results in junior faculty more able to focus on their science and helps them in meeting thehigh scientific expectations of the BSI.
The Council noted that many current faculty are concerned about the financial costs of obtaining
appropriate education for their children.

IV. INTERNATIONALIZATION
Neuroscience is a rapidly growing, interdisciplinary field that is broadly international. It is not possible
to fully participate in such a field without a strong international faculty of the highest quality. Japan hasa broad and active neuroscience research community and among all the excellent groups in Japan theBSI has the highest number of international researchers. Therefore the international reputation ofJapanese neuroscience is to a large extent driven by the BSI. In the last several years the number ofinternational researchers at the BSI has markedly increased.
6There are several ways to increase the number of the international researchers at the BSI:
•Encourage faculty, fellows, and students to attend more international meetingsand summer courses. This is important for Japanese researchers to gain international reputationand for non-Japanese researchers to maintain connections with colleagues abroad.
•Enhance the international reputation of the BSI by organizing a series of symposia
at major research centers to showcase talent and opportunities.
•Advertise courses and conferences at the BSI aggressively to the internationalcommunity.
•Expand international BSI centers.
There are a number of ways that internationalization of BSI can be further extended to improve
recruitment and retention of the best faculty and postdoctoral fellows:•English is used in the scientific discussion at BSI, but administration and someforms that the scientists must fill out are partly in Japanese. This naturally makes BSI lesswelcoming for non-Japanese scientists.
•Improve the accessibility of international schools for the children of researchers.
•Improve the website to feature BSI researchers and alumni who are now at major
centers around the world.

MEMBERS OF THE BSI ADVISORY COUNCILProf. Stephen F. Heinemann (Chair)
Professor
Molecular Neurobiology Laboratory
Salk InstituteProf. Charles D. Gilbert
Arthur and Janet Ross Professor
Laboratory of Neurobiology
The Rockefeller University"
Prof. Lynn T.Landmesser
Garvin Professor and Chair
Department of Neurosciences, School of Medicine
Case Western Reserve University
Prof. Denis Le Bihan
Professor and Director
NeuroSpin Atomic Energy Commission, Saclay Campus
Prof. Yasushi Miyashita
Professor
Department of Physiology, School of Medicine
The University of Tokyo
7

Prof. Ikue Mori
Professor
Division of Biological Science, Graduate School of Science
Nagoya University
Prof. Mu-ming PooProfessor
Department of Molecular and Cell BiologyUniversity of California at Berkeley
Prof. Louis Reichardt
Professor
Department of Physiology
University of California, San Francisco
Prof. Terrence J. Sejnowski
Professor
The Computational Neurobiology Laboratory
Salk InstituteProf. Wolf Singer
Professor
Department of Neurophysiology
Max Planck Institute for Brain Research
Prof. Charles F. Stevens
Professor
Molecular Neurobiology Laboratory
Salk InstituteProf. Huda Y. Zoghbi
Professor
Department of Molecular and Human Genetics
Baylor College of Medicine8