The TOMODACHI STEM @ Rice team has extensive prior experience in the development and management of international education and research experience programs for U.S. and Japanese science and engineering students. See our Related Programs page for more information.

Research Director
Prof. Junichiro Kono
Rice University, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, Physics & Astronomy, and Materials Science & Nanoengineering
Email: kono@rice.edu

Junichiro Kono received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in applied physics from the University of Tokyo in 1990 and 1992, respectively, and completed his Ph.D. in physics from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1995. He was a postdoctoral research associate in condensed matter physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1995–1997 and the W. W. Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory Fellow in the Department of Physics at Stanford University in 1997–2000. He joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of Rice University in 2000 as an Assistant Professor and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2005. Since 2009, he has been a Professor in the Departments of Electrical & Computer Engineering and Physics & Astronomy at Rice University.

Prof. Kono has extensive international research collaborations and, from 2006 – 2015, served as the Principal Investigator for a National Science Foundation Partnership for International Research and Education (NSF-PIRE) grant, TeraNano PIRE, which focused on the expansion of a unique interdisciplinary U.S.-Japan research and education partnership focused on terahertz (THz) dynamics in nanostructures. The key educational initiative of this NSF-PIRE grant was the award-winning international research experience program for undergraduates called the NanoJapan: IREU Program.

Under Prof. Kono’s leadership, the TeraNano PIRE Center has also expanded opportunities for Japanese students to conduct research at Rice and strengthened Rice’s relationships with our Japanese partners abroad through the signing of university-level Memoranda of Understanding and Exchange Agreements with Osaka University, the University of Tokyo, Hokkaido University, Tokyo Institute of Technology, and Osaka Institute of Technology.  Dean’s level agreements have also been signed with Tohoku University, Tottori University, and Chiba University.

John Marsh
Rice University, Smalley-Curl Institute
Email: john.f.marsh@rice.edu or tomodachistem@rice.edu