A new perspective on lakes: Kawanabe's latest achievements

In October 1996 the Lake Biwa Museum opened in Oroshimo, Japan after 10 years of planing and construction. It is a most ambitious concept and a very impressive facility. By June of 1997 it had attracted almost 800 000 visitors – almost twice the at tendance predicted for the entire first year of operation.The founding Director General of the Lake Biwa Museum is Hiroya Kawanabe. After a distinguished career as professor of ecology at Kyoto University, Hiroya Kawanabe founded the Centre for Ecological Research at Otsu. After retirement from the university he moved to his new position at the Lake Biwa Museum. Kawanabe-san is internationally recognized for his pioneering and collaborative research on the ayu, Pleoglossus altivelis, Lake Biwa and the ecology of Lake Tanganyika fishes (Kawanabe 1996, Kawanabe et al. 1997). The Lake Biwa Museum is not only the pinnacle of his personal and professional achievements, but also the physical embodiment of his philosophy of science and life.