Kazunari Shibata

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As far back as I can remember, I was always fascinated by the aliens that appeared in Tezuka Osamu's manga. My curiosity about the mysteries behind the reason for my own existence led me to my dream of becoming someone who researches the universe. It was around the time when I entered Kyoto University in 1973 that I first learned enormous explosions were taking place at the centers of galaxies billions of light years away. I decided to make these explosions at galactic centers—one of the greatest mysteries of the universe—the lifelong subject of my research. However, because these events were so distant, I figured that it would be difficult to unravel their mysteries during my lifetime. So instead, I would observe the mystery through theory.

Around that time, I was astonished to learn that even the Sun, which I thought held no mysteries, still had and unsolved mystery: the origin of sunspots. I also learned explosions called flares occasionally occur near sunspots. Although these flares are much smaller in scale than explosions at the centers of galaxies, they are similar in nature. Since we already knew that magnetic fields play an important role in solar flares, I thought, "This could be a clue!" So, when I entered graduate school in 1977, I began researching solar flares and magnetohydrodynamics in astrophysical objects through numerical simulations.

In 1985, working with Dr. Yutaka Uchida, I became the first in the world to successfully simulate how high-speed jets are ejected from an accretion disk at the center of a galaxy by the force of magnetic fields. Then in 1991, I transferred to the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan and joined the Yohkoh Solar Observatory Satellite Project, after which I began studying observational data analysis alongside my theoretical research. After going back to Kyoto University in 1999, I also became involved in forecasting the space storms caused by solar flares—a field known as space weather forecasting.

My research into superflares on Sun-like stars began in 2010 with a question: "How powerful could the largest possible flare on the Sun be?"Working with first-year undergraduate students, I began investigating this question, and the research developed far beyond what I could have imagined, sparking worldwide interest in the study of superflares. The reason is that superflares are also related to the habitability of exoplanets. Perhaps it was thanks to superflares that we came into existence. This brings me back to my childhood, when I wondered about the mystery of my own origins, and every day brings new excitement as I continue this journey of discovery.