Akira Sawa
Visiting Adjunct Professor, Music Therapy
Pronouns
he/him/his
Employed Since
Fall 2025
Educational History
M.D. University of Tokyo
Professional Highlights
Akira Sawa is a psychiatrist and neuroscientist who holds a full-time academic appointment at Johns Hopkins University and clinical credentials at Johns Hopkins Hospital. He serves as the director and chair of the Johns Hopkins Schizophrenia Center, the director of the Johns Hopkins Initiative for Medical Innovation and NeuroDiscovery, and a professor at Johns Hopkins University. Sawa is interested in how perception and interoception shape emotion, cognition, and even the self within the body-brain axis in both health and disease.
Sawa recently discovered a novel, critical pathology in the nasal cavity of patients with severe mental illness that drives fundamental, treatment-refractory mental changes. Accordingly, novel treatments directly targeting the olfactory system could revolutionize therapeutic strategies for brain disorders. Likewise, Sawa is also interested in the potential of intervening with the auditory system to influence human brain function. Altogether, Sawa’s role is to provide education from the perspective of a medical doctor who believes in the profound impact of music on brain health and disease.
Research
- Johns Hopkins Initiative for Medical Innovation and NeuroDiscovery (Johns Hopkins iMIND)
- Akira Sawa’s Bibliography | National Library of Medicine
Personal Highlights
Akira Sawa’s family — his wife, daughter, and son — shares a deep passion for music and sports. Sawa’s own tastes span British post-punk and classical instrumental music. Mirroring his disciplined approach to medicine and science, he values artistic pieces characterized by innovation, rigor, and sincerity. While he loves post-punk icons like Joy Division, he holds a profound respect for composers from the baroque to the contemporary era, including J.S. Bach, Anton Bruckner, and Toru Takemitsu. Sawa often likens his medical directorship to conducting an orchestra, channeling the spirit of legends such as Sergiu Celibidache, Otto Klemperer, Evgeny Mravinsky, and Karl Richter.