Yasuo Tanaka (田中靖郎) is a Japanese astrophysicist who won the James Craig Watson Medal in 1994.
He is professor emeritus at the Institute for Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS) (part of JAXA) in Kanagawa, Japan, and was guest scientist at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching, Germany.
He has made major pioneering contributions in X-ray astronomy.
Asteroid 4387 Tanaka is named after him.
