The guest at the new edition of the Interdisciplinary Scientific Seminar organised at WUST was Professor Masami Okamoto from Toyota Technological Institute in Nagoya, who delivered a lecture for the general public entitled "A Fecund Imagination".

Professor Okamoto received a Ph.D. in 1994 from Tokyo Institute of Technology under the supervision of Professor Takashi Inoue. Following post-doctoral stay in National Institute of Advanced Industrial Sci. & Tech., Kyushu, he joined the faculty at Toyota Technological Institute. His recent research interests include cell-based biocomposites, tissue engineering and regenerative medicine, cancer metastasis, cancer stem cells, and epithelial to mesenchymal transition. His publication consists of 150 peer-reviewed publications (h = 44, > 14,500 citations, Oct. 2017). He was the visiting professor, Politecnico di Torino 2011-2012, the recipient of CERI Award 2014 and is the editorial board of more than 10 journals. From 2016 he has been one of the candidates of Novel Prize in Chemistry. He is a vice president of The Society of Rubber Science and Technology, Japan.