About the lab
About NIGAMI LAB
NIGAMI LAB is an independently run research project on bitterness. Literature is collected and structured with the help of AI; every claim carries a confidence label under the lab's research protocol, verified claims show their sources and check status (full text checked / abstract checked), and unverified claims are marked "no source connected".
The lab started with one bowl of intensely bitter soup at a diner in a hot-spring village in the mountains of Chiang Mai, Thailand: tom khom made with cow bile, served with bitter herbs. "What is this bitterness?" The lab's job is to answer that question in a form that leads back to the original papers rather than ending in one person's impression. → tom khom (Japanese)
Who runs it
NIGAMI LAB is run by Masaru Aoki (青木大), based in Japan. He is not a researcher; he works as an editor who collects and structures the literature, in collaboration with AI (Claude) for collection, verification and publication. Editorial decisions and responsibility for what is published rest with him.
- Interests: self-funded; no advertising, sponsors or sample products. The lab does not recommend or rank brands.
- Plans: a bitter seasoning product is planned. When products go on sale, the operator disclosure (business name, address, contact) will be published on a separate page.
- Sister site: kopi+cha (observations of the coffee and tea marketplace), by the same operator. The sites reference each other openly.
- Citing: every topic hub, crossing and research note ends with a "How to cite this page" box. Each claim card has a stable anchor (#clm-…).
- English edition: see the index. Topic hubs first; the encyclopedia remains in Japanese for now.
Corrections
Corrections, newer studies and counter-evidence are welcome. After checking, they are reflected in the text with a correction record and credit to the person who raised them. Contact the lab on Threads at @nigamilab; the "Tell us on Threads" button at the bottom of every page opens a post with that page's URL. Exchanges are public, and what is taken in is recorded on the page with sources.
Data
- Claims, evidence and the source ledger are kept as a CSV knowledge graph and pass machine validation (reference integrity, enumerations, duplicates) before publication.
- Summaries paraphrase the originals; the lab does not reproduce full texts. Numbers and statistics are generalised only from sources checked in full text.
- The knowledge graph is published under CC BY 4.0 (data page, Japanese). Third-party verbatim quotes and images keep their original rights. When quoting the text, cite this site's URL.