At the event space within the exhibition venue, astronaut Naoko Yamazaki delivered a special keynote speech titled “View of Japan, the World and Beyond from Space,” during which she interspersed accounts of her own time in space with her passionate thoughts and hopes for Japan’s future from the perspective of space. Following this, Genichi Tamatsuka, Hisataka Ikuta, and Kazutoshi Kobayashi, all distinguished industry leaders and alumni of Keio University, led a round-table session with the theme “The Role of Keio Faculty of Science and Technology: Industrial Expectations.” Here, they passionately discussed expectations with regard to future alumni of the Faculty of Science and Technology, including the need for leadership as well as the need for individuals with high technological capabilities who also have a keen awareness of management. A further round-table session with the title “Bringing the Keio FST concept to life through basic research—KiPAS in its first four years” was led by the Chair of the KiPAS steering committee and four principal investigators selected from among the tenured faculty members in core academic fields. Here, the importance of basic research and the role of universities were discussed and there were also lively exchanges with event attendees at a Q&A session.
The exhibition venue, in addition to around 100 booths and panel exhibits, hosted group exhibits by researchers of the Chemicals Groups and the Medical-Engineering Collaboration. While there is a time-honored tradition of research being implemented in cooperation between the Faculty of Science and Technology and the Faculty of Medicine, this year’s event saw booths exhibited jointly by Keio University’s Faculty of Medicine and Faculty of Science and Technology in domains in which they particularly excel, including cognitive science, robotics, and rehabilitation. These were intended to highlight research outcomes and technologies of the Medical-Engineering Collaboration. In addition to the presentations by researchers in the Faculty of Science and Technology, in particular those in the Chemicals Group, panel discussions led by faculty members from the School of Medicine and the Faculty of Science and Technology were also held at the two short presentation spaces located within the exhibition venue, with attendees at the venue stopping by to listen attentively. Video relays of interviews with exhibiting researchers who are currently in the spotlight for their innovative or topical research outcomes were again held this year.
This year also saw seminars being held at the joint venue. In addition to faculty members of the Faculty of Science and Technology, overseas researchers and corporate speakers were invited to talk on the themes of “National Logistic Data Center and Connected Industry,” “Human Sensing for Super Mature Society: Towards Sports and Rehabilitation,” and “A New Measurement Technology for PM2.5 in the Atmosphere.”
KEIO TECHNO-MALL 2018 is planned to be held again at Tokyo International Forum on Friday, December 14, 2018. We will continue to promote the KEIO TECHNO-MALL as a platform to facilitate encounters to fulfill KLL’s mission of fostering industry-government-academia collaboration.