On March 18, 2009, Prof. Jacques Samarut, President of the elite French graduate school École Normale Supérie ure de Lyon (ENS Lyon), visited IMSUT one day before the signing ceremony for a cooperation agreement with President Komiyama, the University of Tokyo.

　Prof. Samarut's visit to IMSUT was part of a week-long trip to Tokyo to promote academic cooperation between biomedical researchers in ENS Lyon and Tokyo. For Prof. Samarut, IMSUT was familiar ground since he spent 4 months in 1984 carrying out research in the same laboratory as former Dean—but at that time still Associate Professor—Tadashi Yamamoto. During a busy day Prof. Samarut spoke with many faculty members here, presented a seminar on his lab oratory's work on thyroid nuclear hormone receptors, and held a strategy meeting, chaired by IMSUT Vice-dean Kiyono, to explore how best to go about establishing and promoting student and faculty exchange programs. In addition to Dr. Samarut and Kiyono, participants in the meeting included ENS Director of International Relations Dr. Jan Matas, Dean Motoharu Seiki, Prof. Shigeaki Kato of the Institute of Cellular and Molecular Biosciences, Prof. Sumio Sugano of the Medical Genome Science program in the Graduate School of Frontier Sciences, Prof. Tadashi Yamamoto and members of the IMSUT International Relations Office. Both sides recognized the dedication of the other to academic and scientific excellence, and came out of the meeting with a common commitment and preliminary roadmap for implementing academic and scientific exchange programs between our respective insitutions. The evening ended with a dinner at the Chinese restaurant "Fureika" in Azabujuban.