Oral History: Eiichi Fukada (2014)

Eiichi Fukada was born on 28 March 1922 in Kokura, Japan. He received the B.Sc. degree in 1944 and the D.Sc. degree in 1960, both from the Department of Physics, University of Tokyo. He was a research member at the Kobayasi Institute of Physical Research (KIPR), Tokyo from 1944 to 1963; British Council Scholar at the Department of Physics, Imperial College of Science and Technology, London from 1956 to 1958; Chief Research Member of the Biopolymer Physics Laboratory, the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (RIKEN), Tokyo from 1963 to 1980; Executive Director of RIKEN from 1980 to 1984; Research Advisor at the Institute for Super Materials, ULVAC, Tsukuba from 1987 to 1998; and a member of the Board of Directors at KIPR from 1992 to 2002. He has been an advisor of KIPR since 2002. He was Visiting Professor at Gakushuin University, Tokyo in 1961-1980, New York University in 1965-1966, University of San Paulo in 1974, Technical University of Darmstadt and University of Constance in 1986. He has published about 250 papers in English and about 200 papers in Japanese. He received several awards from academic societies in Japan, the Galvani Award from the International Symposium on Electrobiology in 1989 and the Poiseille Gold Medal Award from the International Society of Biorheology in 1995. His research areas include piezoelectricity of biological and synthetic polymers, electrical stimulation of bone growth, and biorheology of blood and its clotting. Dr. Fukada discovered piezoelectricity in bone and initiated a field of research that is active to this day. He also found piezoelectricity in innumerable other biological materials including DNA.

In this interview, Dr. Fukada describes his childhood, his undergraduate research at the University of Tokyo in the final days of World War II, the founding of the Kobayasi Institute of Physical Research, and his early research on the elastic properties and piezoelectricity of wood. He discusses his meeting with Dr. Iwao Yasuda and their discovery of piezoelectricity in bone in 1957 and its long-term importance. He talked about his research at Imperial College and his return to Japan to obtain his D.Sc. degree from the University of Tokyo. He described leaving the Kobayasi Institute and his move to Riken where he carried out research on rheology, hemorheology, and biorheology. He discussed his research on electrical stimulation of bone growth with his collaborators in Japan and the United States, and his understanding of the electrical stimulation mechanism. He talked about his research on biopolymers and on piezoelectricity in poled polymers. He described his retirement from Riken in 1980 and his continued activities there on a more managerial level. The interview was concluded with a discussion of his numerous visiting professorships, his comments on future directions in his field, and his active research continuing to this day.