Kotaro Honda


Kotaro Honda, born on February 23, 1870 in Okazaki, Aichi Prefecture – February 12, 1954) was a Japanese scientist and inventor. He invented KS steel, which is a type of magnetic resistant steel that is three times more resistant than tungsten steel. This material, which had 250 oersteds magnetic resistance, was developed through rigorous basic research on steel and alloys.
Honda was born in the town of Yahagi from 1940. He served as the first president of the Tokyo University of Science from 1949.
Honda was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1932, and was one of the first persons to be awarded the Order of Culture when it was established in 1937. He was also awarded the Franklin Institute's Elliott Cresson Medal in 1931 and became a Person of Cultural Merit in 1951. He was posthumously awarded the Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun.
Honda died in 1954 in Bunkyo, Tokyo, and his grave is at the temple of Myogen-ji in Okazaki.

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