The kick-off meeting in Europe was organized by Vice-Director Professor Ueli Grossniklaus. It took place on November 21, 2023, at the University of Zurich in the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology, with 69 attendees.

At the symposium, lectures were given by KEPLR members. During the poster session, discussions took place between the presenters, who are young researchers, and other researchers.

I am a postdoc in my second year but I had little experience going abroad. Of course, there were some plans to interact with overseas university laboratories and participate in international conferences when I was a student. But they did not materialize for a variety of reasons. I attended the kick-off meeting in the hope that it would provide me with an opportunity to make connections and gain confidence in my plans to study abroad.

While listening to the oral presentations in the morning of the kick-off meeting, I felt quite nervous. This is because I was not confident in my English. I wondered whether I would be able to sufficiently convey the interest in my research in front of world-renowned high-level research presentations and whether I would be able to understand the questions and engage in appropriate discussions.

However, when it came time for the flash talk to introduce the content of the poster presentation, I found that the participants were nodding their heads and listening to my presentation. As I spoke, I felt confident that my English was understood and that my ideas were being conveyed. In the poster presentation that followed, I was able to convey my research in a dignified manner, and I was able to get some new feedback. I would like to continue to improve my English and communication skills so that I can interact with more researchers in the future.

As a matter of fact, I am in charge of drafting the logo for KEPLR. I designed the logo so that the central dot represents a researcher and the lines representing the network among researchers form the outline of a flower. The reason for the flower motif is that this project focuses on plant reproduction, and it also means that young researchers like me will "bloom" as accomplished researchers through their overseas experience. I would like to use this kick-off meeting as an opportunity to study abroad and devote myself to blooming as a researcher.

The Interdisciplinary Strategic Partnership Tokyo – Zurich Symposium 2023 was held, featuring a Poster Session with 31 presenters. Kengo Sakurai, a doctoral student in the Iwata Group, won an award for his presentation titled 「Crossing Strategy for Plant Breeding」.

Name of the award: “Interdisciplinary Strategic Partnership Tokyo – Zurich Symposium 2023” Poster Award

Presentation title: 「Crossing Strategy for Plant Breeding」
1Kengo Sakurai, 2Kosuke Hamazaki, 1Minoru Inamori, 3Akito Kaga, 1Hiroyoshi Iwata

1 Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Tokyo
2 RIKEN Center for Advanced Intelligence Project (AIP), RIKEN
3 Institute of Crop Science, Natural Agriculture and Food Research Organization

The application process for the Vienna BioCenter Summer School, set to take place in 2024, has begun

The 'Interdisciplinary Strategic Partnership Tokyo – Zurich Symposium 2023' was held in Zurich on the 15th and 17th of October 2023. This symposium was organized to promote collaboration between the University of Tokyo, the University of Zurich, and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. We, KEPLR, co-hosted the 'Workshop on Plant Biology'.