Falling Walls Lab Sendai 2024

Twelve young researchers and entrepreneurs from eight countries took part in this year's Falling Walls Lab Sendai, held at the TOKYO ELECTRON House of Creativity on Katahira Campus on August 1.

This was the 11th time that Tohoku University has hosted the event, which is part of the wider Falling Walls Conference held annually in Berlin.

This year, all 12 participants were from Tohoku University, with Upasana Jhariya from the Graduate School of Environmental Studiestaking first place with her topic Breaking the Wall of Heavy Metals Waste. In her presentation, she spoke of heavy metal contamination in water caused by acid mine drainage. "Because the metals don't degrade," she said, "they can have toxic effects when they get into the system of humans and other living organisms."

She then proposed a sustainable hybrid solution involving the application of iron-oxidising bacteria. "This naturally occurringbacteria utilizes the iron and sulphur present in mine drainage and produces iron nanoparticles which are incredibly effective in absorbing heavy metals from water," she said, adding that the iron nanoparticles can be re-used, making the process cost effective and sustainable, while the absorbed heavy metals can also be recycled for economic purposes.

Kaho Matsumoto from the Graduate School of Agricultural Sciencetook second with her topic Breaking the Wall of Relying on Medicine, in which she proposed using immunobiotics, instead of potentially harmful antiviral drugs, to prevent infection in animal livestock.

"Immunobiotics are living microbes that can regulate the immunity of the host, but they are difficult to handle as feed and food because they're living organisms," she said. "So my research explores a completely new approach that is finding the good metabolites of immunobiotics which can, in the long run, contribute to animal and human health."

Third place went to Andrey Stephan Siahaan from the New Industry Creation Hatchery Centre (NICHe)for Breaking the Wall of White Phosphorus Sustainability. Phosphorus is an essential element for agriculture and industry and is a non-renewable resource.

So as a solution to the growing "phosphorus loss crisis," his research proposes the extraction of crude phosphoric acid from wastes such as steelmaking slag. "Japan is one of the countries that has no phosphorus resource, but it has secondary phosphorus resource that can be established. So this project is really interesting to me," he said.

Members of the jury said they were impressed by the presentations, and urged all participants to continue working on ways to clearly and concisely articulate the message of their research.

"I could see that there was a lot of effort, and I was really impressed by how everyone was able to incorporate so much good information in their three minutes," said Tohoku University's Executive Vice President for Research Asako Sugimoto, who was on the judging panel.

Falling Walls Lab is an international competition based in Berlin and started in 2011 to encourage innovative solutions to contemporary problems. Contestants pitch their initiatives in three minute presentations, and field questions from the jury. Contestants are judged on the "breakthrough factor" of their research, the social relevance of their work and the persuasiveness of the presentation.

Falling Walls Lab Sendai, as a regional qualifying event, is held every year and attracts contestants from all disciplines. The first and second place winners will go to Berlin in November where they will compete against other young researchers from around the world.

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