Symposium on “Retinoid Research and Clinical Application” Supported by the Japanese Cancer Association

The Symposium on “Retinoid Research and Clinical Application” was held on November 10 and 11, 1989 at the Lecture Hall of the Foundation for Promotion of Cancer Research in Tokyo, within the framework of the activity of the Japanese Cancer Association. The organizers were Dr. Koichi Shudo, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Tokyo, Dr. Yasutoshi Muto, First Department of Internal Medicine, Gifu University, and Hirota Fujiki, Cancer Prevention Division, National Cancer Center Research Institute, Tokyo. For preparation of this Symposium, we organizers first consulted Japanese scientists from various research fields about their interest in a Symposium on this subject, since this was the first meeting on retinoid research in Japan. Based on those discussions, we decided to extend invitations from the Japanese Cancer Association to more scientists than usual. That is, six presentations by invited foreign scientists were planned to be included in this Symposium. They were given by Dr. Pierre Chambon from France and Drs. Michael B. Sporn, Peter J. A. Davies, Richard C. Moon, Gregor Eichele and Gary Peck from the United States. In addition, there were 43 oral presentations from Japanese participants. The purpose of the Symposium was to impart and to discuss information concerning the present status of retinoid research at the international level. The meeting was divided into two parts; morning, for short presentations by the Japanese scientists, and afternoon, for three plenary lectures by the invited speakers each day. As scientific languages, Japanese was used in the morning and English in the afternoon. Over 300 participants were registered for two days. This number indicated the high level of current interest in research on retinoids.