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Nagamori Foundation held the Fifth Nagamori Awards Ceremony at Kyoto Hotel Okura on Sunday, September 08, 2019 to honor the winners of the awards and the recipients of the research grant for 2019. The ceremony was attended by approximately 200 people including the winners of Nagamori Awards, research grant recipients, many academics, and those related to Nagamori Foundation.
After the presentations and the panel exhibition by the six award winners followed by review from the members of Nagamori Foundation’s Review Committee, Dr. Takashi Kato, Senior Manager, EV system Laboratory, Research Division, Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., Japan, was chosen as the Grand Nagamori Award winner.
The ceremony began with Prof. Hori, the Review Committee’s Chairman, explaining how the winners were selected, followed by the announcement of the Fifth Grand Nagamori Award. Each winner received a commendation certificate and a prize cup from Mr. Nagamori, President of Nagamori Foundation, and then representing the award winners, Dr. Kato delivered a speech to express the pleasure of receiving the Grand Nagamori Award.
The next part of the ceremony was to present research grants (“Research Grant 2019”) to the 30 young researchers, mostly associate or assistant professors at universities (10 new and 20 renewal recipients). Dr. Kohei Aiso, Assistant Professor of Waseda University, made a speech to appreciate the grant on behalf of all the grant recipients.
There were also two special lectures. Dr. Kazuya Masu, President of Tokyo Institute of Technology, spoke on “Continuously cultivating the seeds of innovation” and Dr. Atsuo Kawamura, Professor Emeritus, Yokohama National University, on “Challenge to 99.9% Electric Power Conversion Efficiency and the History”.
The entire ceremony, followed by a celebratory party, ended in great success.
Dr. Takashi Kato
（Senior Manager, EV System Laboratory, Research Division, NISSAN MOTOR CO., LTD.）
It is a great honor to receive GRAND NAGAMORI AWARD, which is one of the most prestigious awards for electric motor researchers and engineers. I would like to express my appreciation to all of people related to the awards.
I had been working in the vehicle development department of Nissan since 1997, then moved to the EV system laboratory of research division in 2001 for working on traction motor development as one of the key technology for future electrified vehicles.
In general, permanent magnet synchronous motors (PMSMs) have been used for vehicle traction motors. PMSMs have achieved high efficiency and miniaturizing characteristic by using high performance magnets, low iron loss steel, high density winding, magnetic circuit design and FEA technologies. On the other hand, additional technology developments would still be needed for vehicle traction motors, which is required wide driving range, and variable flux motor technology could be one of the possible solution.
We are honored to receive the good recognition for the technology we have been working on, then it was found that our research direction would meet the social and industrial needs. I would be contributing through motor research and power electronics developments to realize human-friendly and sustainable society. Finally, I would like to thank Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., my colleagues, professors who gave me a lot of useful advices, and my family continuously supporting me for a long time.
