Makoto Suwa

Makoto Suwa is a Japanese climate scientist and astronaut with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

Early life

Suwa was born in Tokyo in 1977 and grew up in Tsukuba, Ibaraki. At a young age he visited the Expo 85 held at Tsukuba. While in elementary school he travelled to NASA where he met Apollo astronaut Gene Cernan.

Education and career

Suwa graduated from the University of Tokyo in 1999. He received a Ph.D. in climate science from Princeton University, and a master of environment management degree from Duke University. In 2008 he joined the Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers and was dispatched to Rwanda, where he served as a lecturer at the Kigali Institute of Science and Technology. He then worked for the World Meteorological Organization, both at its Geneva headquarters and Office for Eastern and Southern Africa at Nairobi, Kenya. From 2014 he worked at the World Bank's Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery; at the time of his astronaut selection he held the role of Senior Disaster Risk Management Specialist.
On 28 February 2022, JAXA selected Suwa as an astronaut candidate alongside Ayu Yoneda. Chosen at the age of 46, he is the oldest JAXA astronaut candidate at the time of selection. He completed basic training and was certified for flight by JAXA on October 21, 2024.
On September 2025, Suwa participated in the ESA CAVES 2025 course held in the Matese mountains in the Italian Apennines.
On 9 January 2025, JAXA announced that Suwa would be assigned to a long-duration mission to the International Space Station in 2027.