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The 2019 Kyoto Prize
Open to the public, the Kyoto Prize Commemorative Lectures are great opportunities to hear up-close what laureates have to say about their exceptional contributions to the progress of science and spiritual betterment of humankind. Expect to be graced with not just what they have studied and achieved, but also their outlook on life, their values, their way of thinking, and other aspects of their individual perspectives. Please consider attending the event.
2019
11 /11 Mon
13:00 - 16:00
Place： Kyoto International Conference Center
Capacity：1,500 persons (FCFS)
Languages：Simultaneous interpretation is provided.
Admission Free
The 2019 Kyoto Prize Kyoto Prize Laureates
Lecture topics
Evolution of OLED Display Technology
Abstract of the lecture
My first experience with organic light emitting diode (OLED) took place at the Kodak Research Laboratories. Hired in 1975 as a research chemist, I began my career with an assignment to develop efficient and low-cost solar cells for light to electricity conversion. Specifically, I was asked to look into using organic dyes and pigments as alternative photovoltaic materials to inorganic semiconductors such as silicon. After spending nearly three years on the project, I was still nowhere close to the device performance needed for practical use. Frustrated, I was about to move on to other projects when I saw the light, literally, from a poorly constructed solar cell when it was driven with excessive current. Thus, I found myself with a new project having the opposite focus—converting electricity to light. Little did I know that this discovery would lead to a premier display technology decades later. In 1987, almost a decade after the discovery, I published a paper in Applied Physics Letters (co-authored with Steve Van Slyke) describing the bi-layer structure, material composition, and device performance of an OLED device, referred to as an organic electroluminescent diode in the paper. It turned out that the bi-layer structure held the key to achieving a high electricity to light conversion efficiency. Also known as an organic heterojunction, its utility had first been realized in my prior work on organic solar cells. With the bi-layer structure, charge generation (in solar cells) or recombination (in OLED) is greatly enhanced by confining these processes, via excitons, at its interface. In the OLED case, the efficiency gain is the result of maximizing the radiative recombination at the bi-layer interface while minimizing the non-radiative recombination at the electrodes. This milestone paper ushered in a worldwide effort to develop OLED for display applications. Display technologies have progressed rapidly over the last few decades, advancing from cathode ray tubes to flat-panel displays. Among various flat-panel displays, liquid crystal display has been the leading technology—until the emergence of high-performance OLED displays in recent years. With its numerous attributes, OLED has laid claim to the best display technology ever developed. In this presentation, I will trace the evolution of OLED from its discovery to its commercialization from my personal perspective.
Lecture topics
Understanding the Universe and the Things That Live in It Through Astronomical Surveys
Abstract of the lecture
Astronomers have been charting the heavens for thousands of years, recording the positions of stars and planets and estimating their brightnesses. Before our understanding of the physics of astronomical objects, these charts, maps, and catalogs were mostly of religious, navigational, and calendar interest, though the very accurate catalogs of positions recorded by Tycho allowed the geometry of the solar system to be worked out by Kepler, and allowed the orbits to be explained by Newton with his theory of gravitation. Physics had come to astronomy. Today astronomy is all physics and chemistry of astronomical objects (and still quite a lot of wonder, in case “you” wondered). We do research of two sorts, mainly. On the one hand, working on the specific properties of one or a few objects to understand in detail how they work as individuals, or, on the other hand, gathering data and studying whole populations of objects or the physical structure of the whole universe through large surveys. This is the subject which has been the primary emphasis of most of my career and which I will discuss in my lecture. The universe is populated by galaxies, which are made of stars and gas and dust and a collection of weird objects which stars leave behind when they die. These aggregate into groups and clusters, which are the largest coherent structures in the universe. There are typically a hundred billion stars in a galaxy like our own, and the observable universe holds of order a hundred billion galaxies. These numbers are too vast to allow study of each individual object of any kind, and surveys are designed to allow us to study their statistical properties, thus enabling us to extend the study of many representative individuals to the whole population by doing a census of the kinds of objects in the population. The Sloan Digital Sky Survey which I originated and served as Project Scientist for many years obtained such a study of the nearby universe. Light travels at finite speed, so studying a population of very distant (and faint) objects allow us to see what objects in the universe were like in the distant past. Surveys underway now with large telescopes, including the Japanese Subaru Telescope, will enable us to open this history book on the evolution and development of the universe.
Lecture topics
Did You Really Know to Whom You Were Giving This Prize?
Abstract of the lecture
We are such stuff as dreams are made on… William Shakespeare, The Tempest What is the fabric that the winner of such a majestic award as the Kyoto Prize is made of? Who made me? From which dreams of which countless dreamers did I come? Who created me? Unintentionally, unknowingly. Without ever knowing me. Preceding me by many centuries or even several millennia. Who, long before me and much more than I, deserved this award? How can we remember these countless respectable winners, glorious or anonymous? How can we invoke them? How can we name them and do justice to them? With what milk, with what bread was I fed? And above all, who milked this milk, who kneaded this bread? On what land has this wheat grown? Who harvested it? Under what sun? Which country has protected me and which countries have cultivated me? Who are the women and men who have created me without even imagining their mutual existence? To whom do I owe for being myself? Who should I thank and who should I curse? What multitudinous footsteps should I walk in to express my gratitude, my frustration and sometimes my fright? All these paths led to my imperfect little self but, as is the case with every human being, they form a planetary network. These are the paths I will have to track down, to study and interpret in order to write this speech. This speech is highly intimidating for me. At the same time, I must admit, the frightening obligation has the virtue of pushing me towards this investigation and recognition. By awarding it to me, to how many hundreds, maybe thousands, of women and men, have you, in truth, awarded this benevolent and sumptuous prize? To whom do I owe all this? These privileges, this loving environment, this comfort, this luxury, this beauty, this refinement, this respect: to whom do I owe them? To whose and how many’s sweat, courage, heroism, sacrifice, devotion, constancy, obstinacy, genius and enlightenment? How many fights and deaths did it take for me, a woman, to live free, to freely serve theatre and to receive such an honour?
Organized by Inamori Foundation
Supported by Kyoto Prefectural Government, Kyoto City Government, Kyoto Prefectural Board of Education, Kyoto City Board of Education, Kyoto Chamber of Commerce and Industry, The Consortium of Universities in Kyoto, The Kyoto Shimbun, Nihon Keizai Shimbun, The Asahi Shimbun, The Mainichi Newspapers, The Sankei Shimbun, The Yomiuri Shimbun, Jiji Press, Kyodo News, NHK, Kyoto Broadcasting System, α-STATION FM KYOTO
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