Sake Masters and Sake Doctors

After establishing its interdisciplinary Sakeology Center in 2018, Niigata University now has postgraduate Sakeology courses available to students from the Graduate School of Modern Society and Culture and the Graduate School of Science and Technology. 

The centre acquired a license for experimental brewing in 2021, which allows students on its courses to brew their own sake so they can experience and manage the whole process. The first courses were for undergraduates (Sakeology A in 2018, Sakeology B in 2019 and Sakeology C in 2021), followed by the Masters Sakeology Program in 2022 and Doctoral Program in 2023.

NHK news footage shows the students on the masters program using aroma compound samples to link components in the sake (based on analysis by the university) with aromas, giving them a better understanding of how and why aromas are generated in the brewing process.

Professor Dai Hirata, Vice-Director of the Sakeology Center, commented that he hopes the Masters and Doctoral Programs will allow students to experience sake while understanding the depth and breadth underlying it, and by doing so encourage them to become sake evangelists.

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If you want all the details of how koji enzymes and yeast transform carbohydrate/starch to sugar, and sugar to alcohol, have a look at the “Sake brewing microworld tour” video (scroll down on this page), which features Tatsuo Ushiki, MD, PhD and head of Niigata University combining his hobby of drawing with his discipline of anatomy to create illustrations of the microbes involved in sake brewing, and a sequence where Ikuhisa Nishida, Assistant Professor at the Sakeology Center, is miniaturised and swims around in fermenting sake, complete with emerging at the end with wet hair full of rice grains 🤣

Sources:

• Sakeology Center Niigata University Instagram
• Sakeology Center website (English)
• NHK News Web 新潟大学 日本酒学プログラム“利き酒”講義 評価方法を学ぶ (22 Jul 2024, Japanese)