Director's Message

The Education and Research Center for Advanced Structural and Functional Materials Design (the Center) was originally planned by materials science and engineering faculty members at the Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University. The concept of the Center was realized on the basis of the 21st Century Center of Excellence (COE) Program (2002–2006) by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japan. During the five years of the 21st Century COE, the Center successfully fostered young elite researchers through its own unique educational projects. Outstanding academic achievements were also accomplished through research projects, especially interdisciplinary collaborations. The Center was further supported by MEXT’s subsequent Global COE program (2007–2011).

The Center is currently one of the most competitive centers in the field of materials science and engineering in the world. Because the major objective of the Center is to foster super-elite researchers, its concept should continue even after termination of governmental support. Meanwhile, the Joint Research Laboratories on Materials Processing were established under collaborations with steelmaking industries. Yamamoto Memorial Hall (Frontier Research Center No. 2) was built in December 2007 by a donation from a philanthropic graduate to support these activities, and the Global COE and the Joint Research Laboratories were settled here. This allowed for availability of infrastructure in terms of both organization and facility for education and a research base for materials science.

Based on these factors, in April 2008, Osaka University officially approved the Center as a facility attached to the Graduate School of Engineering; Education and Research Center to further strengthen collaborations among the Division of Materials and Manufacturing Science, related research institutes and centers, and other divisions and departments such as the Department of Adaptive Machine Systems. The major objective of this official center is permanent fostering of super-elite young researchers in the field of materials science and engineering through unique education projects.