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Human Ecology Lab
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A human ecology lab that studies people's lives and health through fieldwork in developing countries.
AboutAbout the lab
For the safety, health, and well-being of children worldwide.
The Human Ecology Lab (SmileLab) studies how humans adapt to their environments and how they interact with them.
The lab conducts fieldwork in rural and fishing villages, urban slums, and traditional societies in developing countries to study people's ways of life and their health.
The lab's mission is to contribute to the safety, health, and well-being of children, who are the most vulnerable members of local communities.
The lab is recruiting graduate students interested in overseas field research, regardless of whether they come from science, humanities, or healthcare backgrounds, and including working professionals.
Key terms
- Human ecology
- Human ecology: a field that studies how humans adapt to their environments and how they influence each other
- Fieldwork
- Fieldwork: a research method in which researchers go to and stay in the region they want to study, and observe and investigate people's lives
- Sanitation
- Sanitation: a collective term for the treatment of human waste and for sanitation facilities such as toilets and their management
NewsLab news
View More ↗ResearchResearch themes
The lab conducts fieldwork in rural and fishing villages, cities, and traditional societies in developing countries, studying people's ways of life, their health, and their adaptation to living environments. It also works on water, toilet, and hygiene problems in urban slums, and on children's nutrition, physical activity, and growth.
*Illustrative imageToilets and sanitation in developing countries
To solve the toilet problem in urban slums in developing countries, this work aims to change residents' awareness of and behavior toward hygiene. The lab explores how to introduce sanitation that fits people's habits and values and includes a system for maintenance and management.
*Illustrative imageWays of life and adaptation to the environment
The lab investigates and evaluates how people in a community interact with their living environment, looking at diet and nutrition, physical activity, and physical fitness.
*Illustrative imageHealth and quality of life of local people
By staying in the field for long periods and seeing things from the same perspective as the people who live there, the lab studies health, quality of life (QOL), and well-being.
*Illustrative imageChild growth and development
A child's growth also reflects the nutrition and health status of the whole group. The lab studies child growth in rural and fishing villages, urban slums, and hunter-gatherer societies in developing countries, and uses it to evaluate people's nutrition and health status.
MembersFaculty
The members of the Human Ecology Lab consist of faculty members, academic researchers and postdoctoral researchers, visiting faculty and visiting researchers, doctoral and master's students, research students, undergraduates doing graduation research, and administrative staff.As of 2026
- ProfessorTaro Yamauchi
- Assistant ProfessorAkira Sai
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Report an errorAbout the images
The top and research theme images are illustrative and were not taken at the lab. They are cropped from Wikimedia Commons images. Cropped CC BY-SA images are provided under the same CC BY-SA license as the original (version shown on each line).
- Top image: “Mukuni Village, Zambia ( )” Ninara / CC BY 2.0 (cropped)
- Toilets and sanitation in developing countries: “Pit latrines in Zambia ( )” SuSanA Secretariat / CC BY 2.0 (cropped)
- Ways of life and adaptation to the environment: “Fresh cassava harvest in a garden” Lebu Ayiga / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Health and quality of life of local people: “House in the community ( )” SuSanA Secretariat / CC BY 2.0 (cropped)
- Child growth and development: “Newborn baby feet (Unsplash)” Janko Ferlič thepootphotographer / CC0 (cropped)
- Related lab (福永研究室
（放射線生物学研究室） ): “Mitochondria 7 -- Smart-Servier” Laboratoires Servier / CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped) - Related lab (助産学/母性看護学/女性医学教室): “Newborn-Baby-Feet” Evan-Amos / Public domain (cropped)
- Related lab (脳機能計測学研究室): “MEG UCHSC” Katie Youngpeter. / CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (病理・免疫検査学研究室): “Renal corpuscle” Ed Uthman (Pathologist) / CC BY-SA 2.0 (cropped)
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