Engineers from Natsume Optical Win Excellence Award at the 'Monodzukuri Nippon Grand Award' Co-sponsored by METI and Three Other Ministries

A research group of seven members, including Kentaro Hiraguri of Natsume Optical Corp. (Iida City, Nagano Prefecture; President: Kunihiko Hosoe) and Professor Hidekazu Mimura of the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, The University of Tokyo, received the Excellence Award at the 10th 'Monodzukuri Nippon Grand Award' co-sponsored by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, and Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. The awarded project is the 'Development of a High-Precision X-ray Mirror for Exploring from the Nano-Sized Micro World to Deep Space Hundreds of Millions of Light-Years Away'. Japan's only precision transfer technology, established through an industry-academia collaboration continuing since 2012, was highly evaluated.

The 7 winners of the 10th 'Monodzukuri Nippon Grand Award' Excellence Award (March 26, 2026, at the Natsume Optical Technology Center)

## Award Overview
- Award Name: 10th 'Monodzukuri Nippon Grand Award' Excellence Award
- Sponsors: Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry; Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism; Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare; Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (4 Ministries Co-sponsoring)
- Awarded Project: Development of a High-Precision X-ray Mirror for Exploring from the Nano-Sized Micro World to Deep Space Hundreds of Millions of Light-Years Away
- Awardees: Kentaro Hiraguri (Natsume Optical Corp.), Professor Hidekazu Mimura (Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, The University of Tokyo), and 5 others (Total 7 members)
- Announcement Date: Thursday, March 5, 2026
- Awardees' Affiliations: Natsume Optical Corp. / Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, The University of Tokyo