It is my great honor to host the 65th autumn annual meeting of the Japanese Society of Pathology (JSP) on November 7th and 8th at Tsukuba International Conference Center in Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki, Japan.

We members of the JSP know that “Basic Pathology” and “Diagnostic Pathology” are the two basic foundations of our science. Although both come under the umbrella of “Pathology”, I guess that all JSP members also feel that the fields of “Basic Pathology” and “Diagnostic Pathology” have been gradually diverging. In this Congress, I think it would be useful to explore the theme of whether or not Diagnostic Pathology is, in fact, a real science, and to consider the extent to which these two fields of pathology overlap and can contribute to future medicine.

The Congress has selected one lecture for the Diagnostic Pathology Award and also presentations on research and diagnostics (Type A and B). Dr. Hatsue Ueda (National Cerebral and Cardiovascular Center) will present an award lecture on the theme of “heart muscle biopsy”. This year, four Type A presentations and 2 Type B presentations have been accepted. These cover a range of studies focusing on the lungs, salivary glands, biliary tract, urinary bladder, ovary, and lymph nodes.

This Congress is also organizing three symposia. The theme of symposium 1 is “The present state and future direction of studies of early-stage malignancies”. I think “precancerous lesions” have become a common focus of both basic and diagnostic pathologists, and I anticipate that this theme will encourage useful discussion. The theme of symposium 2 is “An activation program for training of basic medical MD researchers”. This program is supported by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, and was started in 2017. Personally, I believe that this program will prove to be an engine for recruitment of new pathologists and lead to future developments in pathology. This symposium may provide a chance to invigorate the efforts of this program. The theme of symposium 3 is “How does genome biology change human pathology?” Recently, opportunities to use next-generation sequencing have been increasing, creating a huge database on the genomics and epigenomics of diseases. In this context, I would like to explore the theme of how “human pathology” overlaps with “genome biology”. For this symposium, the Congress has selected three oral presenters from the poster session, who will talk about their latest research results.

This Congress also features two special lectures: one by Professor Masashi Yanagisawa (University of Tsukuba), who received Asahi Prize in 2017, and the other by an invited foreign speaker, Professor Ignacio I. Wistuba, who is a leading molecular pathologist at MD Anderson Cancer Center, USA. For the education lecture, the Congress has secured Mr. Toshihiro Suzuki, a lawyer and also committee member of the Japan Medical Safety Research Organization, who will talk about the role of pathologists in “Medical Accident Investigation Systems”.

Finally, I welcome all JSP members and medical school students and hope that the participants will contribute to fruitful discussions at this 65th autumn annual meeting at Tsukuba science city.

Masayuki Noguchi
President of the 65th Autumn Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society of Pathology