Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Today, the galley crew is preparing turkey and all that goes with it. Since we have many scientists and crew members who are not from the United States, the kitchen workers are also preparing a wide variety of foods, so that everyone can celebrate!

Today I am going to tell you about another of our international scientists, Yuki Morono. Yuki was born in Fukui, Japan and moved to Tokyo with his family when he was six years old. After completing his PhD there, he moved further north to Tsukuba to work for three years. Yuki then moved to his present location in Kochi, where he is away from the large populations and life is less hectic. He enjoys it here, even though he had to give up some of the conveniences of big city life.

While in college, Yuki was interested in the biotechnology field and studied the corrosion of pipes in relationship to microbes. He found that microbes, living within the pipes, helped to increase the corrosion by making their own mini-environment. This lead him to become interested in microbes that could live in polluted waters and break down the pollutants. He went on to earn his PhD in biotechnology at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. While working on his degree, he spent some time doing some research at the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology. There he met Fumio Inagaki, who is one of the co-chiefs on the JR, who asked Yuki to join his research group.

Yuki entered the field of science because he likes discovering new things or new ways of doing things. His engineering ability allows him to do that and it gives him a sense of accomplishment. In college, he worked with others to develop a human-powered airplane.

In his spare time, he likes to spend time with his children and to read books.