Mamoru "Mark" Mohri, (; born 29 January 1948) is a Japanese scientist, a former

NASDA The , or NASDA, was a Japanese national space agency established on October 1, 1969 under the National Space Development Agency Law only for peaceful purposes. Based on the Space Development Program enacted by the Minister of Education, Culture ...

astronaut, and a veteran of two

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable launch system, reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. ...

missions. He is the first Japanese astronaut who was part of an official Japanese space program. The first Japanese person in space,

Toyohiro Akiyama is a retired Japanese TV journalist and professor at Kyoto University of Art and Design. In December 1990, he spent seven days aboard the Mir space station. He became the first person of Japanese people, Japanese nationality to fly in space, ...

, was a journalist who was trained in the Soviet Union.

Biography

Born in

Yoichi, Hokkaidō is a town located in the Shiribeshi Subprefecture, Hokkaido, Japan. Demographics As of September 2018, the population oYoichihas dropped to 18,993 people, a drop of 10% over less than a decade. The density is 160 persons per km2. The total area ...

, Japan, Mohri earned both a BSc and MSc degree in chemistry from

Hokkaido University , or , is a public research university in Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan. Founded in 1918, it is the fifth-oldest government-authorised university in Japan and one of the former Imperial Universities. The university finds its roots in Sapporo A ...

in respectively 1970 and 1972, and a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

degree in chemistry from

Flinders University Flinders University, established as The Flinders University of South Australia is a public university, public research university based in Adelaide, South Australia, with a footprint extending across a number of locations in South Australia and ...

Adelaide Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. The name "Adelaide" may refer to ei ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

, in 1976. Most of Mohri's work has been in the field of

materials A material is a substance or mixture of substances that constitutes an object. Materials can be pure or impure, living or non-living matter. Materials can be classified on the basis of their physical and chemical properties, or on their ge ...

and

vacuum A vacuum (: vacuums or vacua) is space devoid of matter. The word is derived from the Latin adjective (neuter ) meaning "vacant" or "void". An approximation to such vacuum is a region with a gaseous pressure much less than atmospheric pressur ...

science Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...

s. From 1975 to 1985, Mohri was a member of the

nuclear engineering Nuclear engineering is the engineering discipline concerned with designing and applying systems that utilize the energy released by nuclear processes. The most prominent application of nuclear engineering is the generation of electricity. Worldwide ...

faculty of Hokkaido University, where he worked on

nuclear fusion Nuclear fusion is a nuclear reaction, reaction in which two or more atomic nuclei combine to form a larger nuclei, nuclei/neutrons, neutron by-products. The difference in mass between the reactants and products is manifested as either the rele ...

-related projects.

Astronaut career

Mohri was selected by the National Space Development Agency of Japan (now

JAXA The is the Japanese national air and space agency. Through the merger of three previously independent organizations, JAXA was formed on 1 October 2003. JAXA is responsible for research, technology development and launch of satellites into o ...

) to train as a

payload specialist A payload specialist (PS) was an individual selected and trained by commercial or research organizations for flights of a specific payload on a NASA Space Shuttle mission. People assigned as payload specialists included individuals selected by t ...

for a Japanese materials science payload. He flew his first space mission aboard

STS-47 STS-47 was NASA's 50th Space Shuttle mission of the Space Shuttle program, program, as well as the second mission of the Space Shuttle Endeavour, Space Shuttle ''Endeavour''. The mission mainly involved conducting experiments in life and mater ...

in 1992 as chief payload specialist for Spacelab-J. Mohri subsequently made another trip into space as part of mission STS-99 in 2000. As of 2001, Mohri is the Chief Executive Director Emeritus for the

Miraikan The , simply known as the , is a museum created by Japan's Japan Science and Technology Agency, Science and Technology Agency. It was opened in 2001. It is situated in a purpose-built building in the Odaiba District of Tokyo. It can be reached b ...

, the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation in Tokyo.

Honours

On 16 March 2006 Mohri was appointed an Honorary Member of the

Order of Australia The Order of Australia is an Australian honours and awards system, Australian honour that recognises Australian citizens and other persons for outstanding achievement and service. It was established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Monarch ...

(AM), “for service to Australia-Japan education and science relations.”It's an Honour
. Itsanhonour.gov.au (2006-03-16). Retrieved on 2011-06-24.

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mohri, Mamoru 1948 births Living people Flinders University alumni Hokkaido University alumni Japanese astronauts People from Yoichi, Hokkaido Honorary members of the Order of Australia Academic staff of Hokkaido University Academic staff of Tokyo Institute of Technology Space Shuttle program astronauts