Okayama University’s Research Administrator (URA) office hosted its 2nd International Research Seminar on November 12th at the 50th Anniversary Hall with the objective of promoting the globalization of research capability of Okayama University.

Dr. Michel Pons, Research Director at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and Director of the laboratory “Le laboratoire de Science et Ingénierie des Matériaux et Procédés (SIMaP)” lectured on the material science research and the development of multifunctional materials carried out at his laboratory. In his talk, he emphasized the importance of transversal research by saying that “In our laboratory, all physicists, material and fluid mechanics specialists and chemists study the preparation, forming, and assembly of materials as well as their properties for structural and functional applications to energy, microelectronics, metallurgy and so on. They combine experimentation and modeling from the atomic level to full process scale on the basis of experimental preparation and characterization facilities. He also provided some examples of their leading-edge research such as Silicon purification using thermal plasma.

The seminar was followed by presentations by three young researchers of Okayama University, Dr. Hideki Hashimoto and Dr. Takashi Teranishi from the Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology, and Dr. Yuta Nishina from the Research Core for Interdisciplinary Sciences.

The seminar provided all the participants an opportunity to share their knowledge and ideas, and also to discuss the possibility of collaborative research and cooperation in the fields of material science and all related areas.

Okayama University is one of the top 19 research universities in Japan selected by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) to receive support for implementation of its Research Enhancement Project launched in 2013. The seminar was organized as part of this project.