The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT)'s Center of Innovation Science and Technology based Radical Innovation and Entrepreneurship Program (COI STREAM) Program selections were announced on October 30, with Okayama University's Advanced Nanocarbon* Center for Composite Structural Materials (ANCS: Research Leader: Dr. Koji Matsuura, lecturer of the Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences) being chosen. Kanazawa Institute of Technology (KIT) will serve as the core site, while Okayama University and the National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS) fulfill satellite roles.

　Twelve core sites and eleven satellites out of 190 applications for COI STREAM were chosen, each site receiving a maximum of 1 billion yen in R&D costs over up to nine years, forming twelve globally competitive Centers of Innovation (COI) as major industry-academia collaborative research sites. The aim is for the sustained creation of achievements to make impacts on the global market.

　Okayama University was selected under the auspices of KIT's project: Construction of Next-generation Infrastructure System Using Innovative Composite Materials: Enabling Society to Coexist with Earth for Centuries in Safety and Security. In order to achieve this vision, KIT will collaborate closely with NIMS and participating institutions on projects to make light, strong and resistant materials using nanocarbon, enabling the provision to society of creative innovations.

Advanced nanocarbons (ANC): Carbon-based materials with controlled nano structures and novel functions which are currently being developed at Okayama University.

Regarding the public selection results for MEXT's COI STREAM program : http://www.mext.go.jp/a_menu/kagaku/coi/1340937.htm
Kanazawa Institute of Technology : http://www.kanazawa-it.ac.jp/kitnews/2013/1195312_3527.html