Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology

Private university in Onna, Japan

26°27′43.01″N 127°49′51.8″E﻿ / ﻿26.4619472°N 127.831056°E﻿ / 26.4619472; 127.831056

Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology

沖縄科学技術大学院大学

Aerial View of Main Campus

Type| Private
Established| 1 November 2011; 13 years ago (1 November 2011)
Budget| ¥22 billion
President| Karin Markides
Provost| Amy Q. Shen

Academic staff

| 89

Doctoral students

| 242
Location|

Onna, Okinawa

Japan

Website| oist.jp

Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (沖縄科学技術大学院大学, Okinawa Kagaku Gijutsu Daigakuin Daigaku, OIST) is a private,[1][2] interdisciplinary graduate school located in Onna, Okinawa Prefecture, Japan.

## Overviews

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Center Building

The school offers a 5-year PhD program in science. Over half of the faculty and students are recruited from outside Japan, and all education and research are conducted in English.

OIST relies on public subsidies paid by the Japanese government.[3] The government subsidy for OIST comes in two areas: a subsidy for operations and a subsidy for facilities.[citation needed]

## History

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Center Court

In June 2001, Kōji Omi, former Minister of State for Okinawa and Northern Territories Affairs and former Minister of State for Science and Technology Policy, announced plans to establish a new graduate university in Okinawa. A Board of Governors was appointed in 2004 and the following year, the Diet recognized OIST as an "Independent Administrative Institution".[4] The first class of students were welcomed in September 2012 after receiving approval.[5]

## Academics

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### Graduate school

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The PhD program is taught entirely in English and is individually tailored to each student. Students are encouraged to focus their research on cross-disciplinary areas of studies.[6] Students are recruited through much higher levels of competition than that of the entrance examination for graduate schools of top national universities in Japan.[citation needed] As of May 2022, there were 242 enrolled PhD students from 50 countries. Of these students, 81% were international and 40% were identified as women.[7]

### Faculty

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As of May 2022, the 89 faculty at OIST—consisting of assistant, associate, and tenured professors—have been recruited globally. Of these 89 faculty, 62% are international and 18% are identified as being women.[7][8]

### Research

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Tunnel Gallery

The research community consists of faculty and researchers divided into "units" based on area of study.[9] The university has no departments—OIST researchers conduct multi-disciplinary research in neuroscience, physics, chemistry, mathematical and computational sciences, molecular, cellular, and developmental biology, environmental and ecological sciences and marine science.[10][7]

### Ranking and Reputation

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Auditorium

According to a 2015 report, completed by an external peer review panel,[11] OIST is on a par with the 25 universities ranked highest by Times Higher Education, QS or Jiaotong World University Rankings in terms of physical campus infrastructure, management structure and management processes, academic program and recruitment of faculty, graduate program, instrumentation, course to research outcome, technology transfer and welfare, social, and cultural support programs.

In 2019 OIST was ranked 1st in Japan and 9th in the world by the Nature Index for the proportion of its research that is published in high-quality science journals when normalised by size (360 unnormalised ranked).[12] In the 2022 Nature Index, without normalisation for size, OIST ranked 14th in Japan and 372nd in the world.[13]

## See also

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* King Abdullah University of Science and Technology

## References

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1. ^ 崇志, 三ツ村 (17 October 2019). "ランキング東大超え。世界から一流研究者が殺到する沖縄科学技術大学院大学が急成長を遂げた秘密". www.businessinsider.jp (in Japanese). Retrieved 18 October 2019.
2. ^ "鳥瞰虫瞰 (18)―沖縄科学技術大学院大学訪問記―OISTの光と影 | コラム | 高等教育研究センター | 兵庫大学 兵庫大学短期大学部". www.hyogo-dai.ac.jp. Retrieved 18 October 2019.
3. ^ Cyranoski, D (29 June 2011). "Made in Japan". Nature. 474 (7353). Nature Publishing Group: 541–542\. doi:10.1038/474541b. PMID 21720321.541-542&rft.date=2011-06-29&rft_id=info:doi/10.1038/474541b&rft_id=info:pmid/21720321&rft.aulast=Cyranoski&rft.aufirst=D&rft_id=https://doi.org/10.1038%2F474541b&rfr_id=info:sid/en.wikipedia.org:Okinawa+Institute+of+Science+and+Technology" class="Z3988">
4. ^ "About — History". oist.jp.
5. ^ Normile, Dennis (28 October 2011). "Japan's New Okinawa Institute Officially Becomes Graduate University". Science.
6. ^ "Degree structure". oist.jp.
7. ^ a b c "OIST Facts and Figures". Retrieved 7 September 2022.
8. ^ "OIST Research Units". Retrieved 7 September 2022.
9. ^ "Research Overview". oist.jp.
10. ^ "Where rats and robots play". The Economist. 26 November 2011. Retrieved 15 December 2011.
11. ^ "Report of the External Peer Review Panel 2015" (PDF).
12. ^ "Top 10 academic institutions in 2018: normalized". Nature. 19 June 2019. doi:10.1038/d41586-019-01924-x. S2CID 241263716.
13. ^ "Institution research output table 2022".

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