Makoto Hayashi is a Team Leader at RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science. He obtained PhD in plant biology from the University of Tokyo in Japan. Afterwards, he worked at Osaka University and the University of Munich (LMU), focusing root nodule symbiosis in legumes for years. He is interested in the molecular mechanism of nodule development, as well as in the evolution of nodulation.
He is currently the chairperson of the international committee for the Japanese Society of Plant Physiologists.