Kaoru Ota is a young female researcher representing Japan. She graduated from the School of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Aizu in 2006, obtained a Master of Science (Computer Science) from Oklahoma State University (USA) in 2008, and stayed at the University of Waterloo (Canada) as a Visiting Scholar in 2010. She is a researcher with an highly global background, having completed the doctoral program at the Department of Computer and Information Systems, Graduate School of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Aizu in 2012. In 2013, she joined Muroran Institute of Technology as an assistant professor, and in July 2022, she became the youngest female faculty member ever at the university, a position she holds to this day.

Her latest research is focused on challenging the limitations of current communication systems, with a focus on special radio wave reflector (RIS) technology, in order to realize the next generation communication standard of "6G", and is focused on research that challenges the limitations of current communication systems. She has conducted a wide range of research on IoT fundamental technologies from both basic and applied perspectives to address the important issues that hinder the realization of IoT. Recognizing the importance of IoT platform technology, she has made remarkable achievements in researching processing distributed technology and energy saving technology, and in 2023, received the Young Scientist Award from the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. Her research on millimeter-wave band RIS was adopted by JST PRESTO in 2021, and has received attention and high praise as a revolutionary technology that improves communication efficiency in indoor communication environments.

Her research has been published in many international academic journals and has been cited more than 13,600 times, and she has been selected as a highly cited author of Clarivate Analytics three times in 2019, 2021, and 2022. Excellent results have been achieved at the cutting edge of technology. She has focused on communication delays in AI tasks processed in the cloud and developed distributed processing technology using edge computing, and her paper published in the international academic journal IEEE Network has received a high number of citations. Of particular note is that as of March 2024, the number of citations in Google Scholar has reached 1,600.

In addition to the results of her papers, she is actively engaged in joint research such as medical-engineering collaboration, and has contributed to solving problems in the local community by establishing the Muroran Institute of Technology Computer Science Center and acting as the center's director.

As mentioned above, her research has had a great impact on the development of next-generation communications, and I would like to add that the results have made a significant contribution not only to academics but also to industry and society. Professor Yasuharu Suematsu, for whom this chapter is named, is known to many as the inventor of single-mode semiconductors, the founder of today's optical communications, and a leader in his field. The professor's name is the most appropriate for the Society's Yasuharu Suematsu Award, as he is also a person who, like Professor Suematsu, is a leader in her field.