Outreach Activities
RIKEN Yokohama does more than just carrying out the latest research; in our public outreach activities, we actively seek to contribute to society by conveying the possibilities in our research findings to the public.
Specific outreach efforts include hands-on events for visitors during our Open Day event, Science Café in which RIKEN researchers and participants talk about science, facility tours for high school students, and participation in external exhibitions.
Open Day
RIKEN Yokohama holds an annual Open Day event where we welcome local community people into our campus to make them learn about our research activities. The Open Day programs include various hands-on events and experiments for both adults and children, such as extracting DNA from familiar plants, lectures by our researchers, and facility tours.
Science Café
In our Science Café, RIKEN researchers are dispatched to libraries and other public locations in Yokohama and the surrounding areas to talk about science with participants in a casual manner, typically over a cup of coffee. Through the discussion, the participants learn and become familiar with such life science topics as health and healthcare.
Facility Tours
RIKEN Yokohama offers facility tours mainly targeted to high school students. The tours are guided by researchers or research staff, and the participants walk and see such facilities as our next-generation, high-speed DNA sequencers and the NMR (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance) devices used to analyze complicated molecular structures of organic compounds.
Exhibitions
RIKEN Yokohama has exhibition booths at the annual Yokohama Science Frontier High School (YSFH) Culture Fest in which we introduce our research activities and demonstrate some scientific experiments. We also participate in such trade shows as “BioJapan” and “JASIS (Japan Analytical and Scientific Instruments Show),” conveying the possibilities in our research findings to the public and seeking for opportunities of alliance with external partners.