The unique feature of Department of Bioresource Development is that students can study the three fields of plants, animals, and insects in one department.

This is a department in which students can have contact with broad learning related to living organisms and nature under the keyword biodiversity. The unique feature is that students can study the three fields of plants, animals, and insects in one department. Another point is that students can research these themes not only on a theoretical basis but also from an agricultural perspective on a practical science basis.

Research laboratories in the field of biodiversity management, for example, conduct such research as conservation of rare species of plants, domestication of wild animals, and exploration of insects that could benefit agriculture. Research fields are not limited to Japan; they extend to areas outside Japan with, for example, efforts to research ecosystem conservation for rare species of animals, such as orangutans on the island of Borneo in Malaysia. The department actively conducts investigations of insects in and outside Japan, with new insect species discovered by Tokyo University of Agriculture numbering more than 1,000.

Research in the field of bioresources utilization, meanwhile, includes such things as the establishment of cultivation methods for natural medicines such as ephedra, platycodon root, and angelica root, and the development of new varieties of crops using advanced technologies such as genomic analysis.

The department wants students to endeavor to develop “an eye for nature” through broad learning. The ability to immediately understand the kind of environment when seeing a satoyama or tropical rain forest is a skill that will be essential in creating sustainable agricultural, environments, and societies in the future.

Laboratories