Dental News - GC Chairman Makoto Nakao receives honorary doctorate

Dental Tribune International

Tue. 18. July 2017

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TURKU, Finland: In acknowledgement of the longstanding mutually beneficial relationship between Japanese dental manufacturer GC and the University of Turku in Finland, GC Chairman Makoto Nakao has been awarded an honorary doctorate from the university’s Faculty of Medicine.

“For me, this is the most significant personal recognition that I have received,” Nakao told the audience at the conferment ceremony in Turku. Although it was not the first award given to him, his previous international honours were primarily from the business sector and from science communities and governments, he said.

The collaboration between GC and the university started in 1999. In cooperation with the Turku Clinical Biomaterials Centre, GC was able to further advance the development of preventive bioactive composites, among other things. In 2013, the fruitful cooperation led to the launch of a dental composite that has since won five different innovation and quality awards.

Playing a vital role in the partnership between GC and the university, Prof. Pekka Vallittu, director of the centre, said that GC is one of the world’s largest developers, manufacturers and sellers of oral biomaterials. Therefore, the cooperation helps ensure that science and research at the university remain updated on the needs of the dental industry.

This year, the medical faculty at the university only awarded one other honorary doctorate, to immunology and stem cell biology expert Prof. Irving Weissman from Stanford University in the US.

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