Ehime University

Kataoka Laboratory

We work to propose adaptation and countermeasures to global environmental problems such as marine plastic pollution and climate change, combining field work with informatics approaches on a background of hydraulic engineering and coastal oceanography.

See our research Meet the team

Greeting

Welcome

Welcome to Kataoka Laboratory, Ehime University

The laboratory has opened in the department of civil and environmental engineering, Ehime University since 2021. To propose an application and countermeasure to global environmental problem (plastic pollution and climate change), we are progressing the researches to investigate environmental contamination (e.g., microplastics, macroplastics) through in-site survey and to develop a technique for quantifying it. Furthermore, we are interested in remote sensing for coastal oceanography (e.g., high-frequency radar, satellite). In this website, we introduce a part of our researches.

Laboratory Logo

Call for Students

We welcome motivated students, including international students, who are interested in marine plastic pollution, coastal oceanography, or remote sensing of ocean waves. If you are considering joining our laboratory as an undergraduate, graduate, or research student, please get in touch with us.

For more details, including information for prospective international students on scholarships such as the MEXT Scholarship, please see A Message from the Faculty on our Member page.

News

What's new

2026/07/02: We have renewed the layout of our website.NEW
2026/04/01: The laboratory members have been updated.NEW
2025/08/06: Shimadzu Co. Ltd. have launched a new software for analyzing microplastic particles in which our model for estimating particulate mass of microplastics has been implemented. Please see the websites of our university and Shimadzu (both websites in Japanese).
2025/08/04: Our new project, entitled 'Research on the Social Implementation of Ocean Wave and Sea Wind Monitoring Using a High-Frequency Oceanographic Radar System (HFRS)' has been accepted for funding by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT). We will develop a service to provide oceanographic data observed by the HFRS. Please visit the website of MLIT in Japanese for more information.
2025/04/14: We have launched a software for monitoring floating macro-plastic litter (Plastic Runoff Identification, Monitoring & Observation System: PRIMOS) via AI with Yachiyo Engineering Co. Ltd. Please see the websites of our university or Yachiyo Engineering in Japanese. And the information of PRIMOS is available here.
2025/04/01: The laboratory members have been updated.
2024/11/20: Mr. Iga, a master's course student, received the Outstanding Presentation Award at the 2024 JSCE Annual Conference. Congratulations! You can find more details on the faculty website here.
2024/10/24: We published a new paper entitled 'Instance segmentation models for detecting floating macroplastic debris from river surface images' in Frontiers in Earth Science. This paper is available from here
2024/07/19: We launched a press release regarding the paper publication in Water Research cooperating with Tokyo University of Science (TUS). Please see the websites of our university or TUS
2024/07/08: We published a new paper entitled 'Geometric relationship between the projected surface area and mass of a plastic particle' in Water Research. This paper is available from here
2024/04/01: The laboratory members have been updated.
2023/11/15: An exchange student joined our laboratory in one month. Please see hereNEW
2023/11/01: We published a new paper entitled 'Applicability of ocean wave measurements based on high-frequency radar systems in an estuary region' in Coastal Engineering Journal. This paper is available from here
2023/10/15: We published a new paper entitled 'An analytical approach to confidence interval estimation of river microplastic sampling' in Environmental Pollution. This paper is available from here
2023/10/01: We published a new paper entitled 'Drones for litter monitoring on coasts and rivers: suitable flight altitude and image resolution' in Marine Pollution Bulletin. This paper is available from here
2023/06/01: We have started Twitter! Please follow our tweets here.
2023/05/01: We started Instagram! We will post research activities. Please follow us here if you are interested in our research activity.
2023/04/07: The laboratory members have been updated.
2023/02/01: We published a new paper entitled 'Experimental uncertainty assessment of meso- and microplastic concentrations in rivers based on net sampling' in Science of the Total Environment. This paper is available from here
2022/08/23: We published a new paper entitled 'Variance and precision of microplastic sampling in urban rivers' in Environmental Pollution. This paper is available from here
2022/04/11: The laboratory members have been updated.
2022/03/23: Prof. Kataoka participated in the international workshop entitled "The future of ocean plastics workshop" as a panelist. If you are interested in this workshop, please see here. You can also register for this workshop for free.
2021/07/01: The laboratory members have been updated.
2021/02/08: This website has been opened.

Research Topics

Plastic transport from land to the oceans

This research aims to clarify plastic transport from land to the oceans by in-site survey and/or developing a technique for quantifying plastics on river and marine environment.

Remote sensing of ocean wave in coastal region

This research aims to develop a technique for measuring ocean waves with high spatiotemporal resolution using high-frequency radars and to clarify a spatiotemporal fluctuation of ocean waves in coastal region.