Open Research Center for Creating a Super-Mature Society (SU)

Center Director: Naoaki Yamanaka (Professor, Faculty of Science and Technology)

Primary Campus: Yagami

The Open Research Center for Creating a Super-Mature Society, established within the Keio Advanced Research Centers (KARC) at Keio University, is a consortium-style open laboratory that integrates with a wide range of domestic and international activities. Its purpose is to create new social systems for the "super-mature society" that Japan is facing ahead of the rest of the world by integrating the humanities and sciences at Keio University, with industry-academia collaborative research with Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT) as its core.

Super-mature society, ICT, ubiquitous, robots, big data

■ Background, Rationale, and Goals for Activities Continuing from Fiscal Year 2016

We are currently conducting research on one theme related to a senior society with a high QoL, one theme on support-type research for extending healthy life expectancy, and two themes on improving the quality of the labor force and creating a creative society. We plan to add one more theme this fiscal year.

■ New Activity Goals, Content, and Implementation Background for Fiscal Year 2017

This year, we plan to add one theme related to a sustainable society. To this end, we are also considering joint research with SFC.

■ Implementation Details, Research Results, and Degree of Achievement for the Fiscal Year's Business Plan

Based on the initial plan and while also reviewing the framework, research was conducted focusing on the following four themes.

By comprehensively combining these, we held symposia, workshops, and laboratory tours for about 100 participants at Keio University's Yagami Campus on April 19 and at the NTT Yokosuka R&D Center on October 30. We also planned and held an affiliated seminar at the Keio Technomall. At the open symposia, we planned lectures by Professor Saito of the Faculty of Business and Commerce and Professor Kokuryo of the Faculty of Policy Management, aiming for an integration of humanities and sciences. For example, while GDP in economics is a function of the working population, in the age of robots and AI, the mechanism for generating capital is different. Furthermore, our center took the lead in planning the affiliated seminar at the Keio Technomall, successfully achieving significant results as an Open Research Lab. While the center is categorized into four project issues, we have successfully created six teams.

Additionally, we have accepted 38 visiting researchers from companies and 2 from overseas, giving the center a significant presence. As a result, we have succeeded in greatly expanding the scope of research in our laboratories.

It is worth noting that the research at this center did not simply involve dividing tasks; rather, we held open seminars and workshops in collaboration with many graduate schools and in cooperation with companies. Furthermore, we have made remarkable efforts as an open research center, such as inviting researchers from partner companies to conduct graduate-level research. In the future, we will further promote internationalization.