Date: August 7, 2026 Venue: Ricoh Company, Ltd., Tokyo office Program: Family event for employees and their children Delivered by: Euglena Co., Ltd.

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1. Summary

On August 7, 2026, euglena Co., Ltd. delivered a hands-on science program at the family event hosted at Ricoh's Tokyo office. This was our second consecutive year of participation. Building on last year's workshop, we expanded the program to include a soap-bubble experience drawn from a research area we have recently strengthened — the science of interfaces.

2. Background

Ricoh's family event had been an internal program until last year, when the company invited an outside partner to contribute for the first time. euglena was chosen for that first collaboration, and we ran a "Euglena Ball" making workshop for the children in attendance. The response encouraged both companies to continue, and we were invited back this year.

3. Strengthening the program: interface science

euglena has reinforced its research on interfaces with the appointment of an executive officer connected to this emerging field. We drew directly on that expertise for this year's event, adding a soap-bubble experience to the program. Soap bubbles are one of the most immediate ways to see interfacial science at work: a thin liquid film, held together by surface tension, that children can create and observe with their own hands.

4. Program content

The session combined a short talk with hands-on activity.

Talk — what euglena is and why it matters

• Biofuel potential. Euglena holds the potential to serve as a feedstock for biofuel, and we introduced this as an example of how a microorganism can contribute to the energy challenges the next generation will inherit.
• Diversity and strain exploration. Euglena is not a single organism but a group with many different kinds, and we shared our ongoing work to search for and identify new strains — an illustration that research is, at its core, an act of looking for what has not yet been found.
• Water that looks red. The children also experienced the fact that water which appears red can owe its color to a red Euglena. Not every Euglena is green: some accumulate a red pigment instead, and a pond or puddle that has turned an unexpected red is sometimes nothing more than a bloom of these cells. Turning a strange sight into an identifiable living organism gave the point about diversity something concrete to hold onto — the variety of Euglena is not an abstraction on a slide, but something that can change the color of water in front of you.

Hands-on — science you can experience

• Soap bubble making. The session closed with the children making soap bubbles themselves, connecting the talk to something they could touch, see, and play with.

5. Significance

Our aim in this program is outreach in its most direct form: talking with the generation who will carry the next era, and passing an understanding of science and technology across generational lines. Children do not need to master the underlying physics or biology to take something away from a session like this. What matters is that they encounter research as something tangible and enjoyable, delivered by the people who actually do it — and that the parents in the room see their company's work connected to that.

6. Going forward

We intend to continue this form of activity. The two years of collaboration with Ricoh have shown that a corporate family event can be a natural setting for cross-company science communication, and we hope to keep developing the program as our research areas expand.