Kochi Core School 2026

An international core school, Kochi Core School, will be held at Kochi Core Center, one of the world’s three major core repositories of the International Ocean Drilling Programme (IODP3). The school is designed for graduate students and early‑career researchers from around the world. It will offer a comprehensive educational program that integrates scientific lectures with hands‑on practical training, providing a learning environment that simulates research activities conducted during actual IODP3 expeditions and legacy‑core research projects such as ReCoRD (Repository Core Re‑Discovery Program) and SPARCs (Scientific Projects using Ocean Drilling Archives). Through this program, participants are expected to develop conceptual understanding and practical competence in core‑based research as well as interdisciplinary collaborative mindset to support the growth of a new generation of researchers equipped to take leadership roles in future ocean‑drilling science.

Kochi Core School 2026 will focus primarily on Miocene stratigraphy and paleoceanography, using sediment cores that record major climatic events such as the Middle Miocene Climatic Transition and Late Miocene Cooling. Participants will conduct a variety of analyses using cores that were actually utilized in two ReCoRD projects from the Japan Sea and the Indian Ocean: ReC23‑01, “Tracing Intermediate Water Current Changes and Sea Ice Expansion in the Indian Ocean,” and ReC23‑03, “The Japan Sea paleoceanography and paleoclimatology during the Miocene.” Through these activities, participants will gain first‑hand experience in collaborative research based on the intensive re‑utilization of legacy cores.

Steering Committee: Yuji Kato (Kochi University), Minoru Ikehara (Kochi University), Yusuke Suganuma (NIPR), Junichiro Kuroda (The University of Tokyo), Ryuji Tada (Chiba Institute of Technology)

Jointly organized by: MaCRI/Kochi University, Kochi Institute/JAMSTEC, AORI/University of Tokyo, J-DESC

Supported by: NIPR 

 Course Fee

The course fee is 30,000 JPY which includes: lectures and lecture notes; coffee breaks; official dinner. The fee does not include: travel, meals, accommodation.

If you are interested in paleoceanography, eager to learn related methodologies/techniques, want to experience collaborative research using drilling cores, or wish to engage in SPARCs, and/or ReCoRD, and IODP3, we highly encourage you to apply for the Kochi Core School 2026.

Registration Process

• To participate the school, please submit the required information via the link ("Registration" button) below. The deadline for application is 15 June 2026.

• Note that in addition to entering the necessary information in the application form, applicants are also required to submit the following documents. The instructions for submitting these documents are provided in the application form. 

  1. • 1) CV or Resume

     • 2) Letter of Motivation (ca. 250–400 words)

     • 3) Supervisor's Support Letter (if applicable)

• To ensure a most effective training the maximum number of participants will be limited to 20. If the number of applicants exceeds the capacity, we will conduct the selection based on the above documents. We will notify applicants of the selection results by July 2026. 

• If you have any questions regarding the application process, please contact the person in charge (Yuji Kato, Kochi University, yuji.kato[at]kochi-u.ac.jp). Please replace “[at]” with “@” when sending your email.