Creation of functional materials for energy efficiency
Creation of functional materials for energy efficiency
*The grant period for this program has ended, but the initiative is continuing as an in-house project at our university.
Program Overview
The purpose of this 21st Century COE Program was to form a global education and research center by efficiently conducting cutting-edge research and development and advanced doctoral education under the unified theme of "Creating functional materials for energy efficiency."
In order to realize the objectives of the 21st Century COE Program, Aoyama Gakuin University as a whole has made efforts to establish a university-wide support system centered around President in order to implement key measures in the following areas:
- 01.By reorganizing Graduate School of Science and Engineering, we aim to individualize, advance, and internationalize our research and education.
- 02. We will work to improve and enhance the research and education environment at Sagamihara Campus, and in particular, we will work to reorganize and enhance the administrative office to provide research support, including for COE initiatives.
- 03. In order to nurture students who can play an active role internationally, we will provide financial support primarily to students in the doctoral program.
Through this, we have strengthened the university's support system for research and education, and implemented measures that will enable our graduate school's research and education to receive international recognition.
Program implementation report
The details of the program are reported below, divided into the research efforts of each research group and the educational program efforts for advanced graduate education.
Initiatives of each research group
| Principal Investigator | theme | Contents |
| Jun Akimitsu | Development of next-generation superconducting materials for energy transfer and storage | This group, which is literally leading the research of superconducting materials in Japan, is characterized by its search for new superconducting materials. |
| Ken Kubo | Analysis of magnetic properties and creation of materials | The two groups have jointly been responsible for the theoretical research of the center, focusing on theoretical elucidation of the magnetic and transport phenomena in magnetic semiconductors that are essential for the development of spintronics, and on the pursuit of guidelines for the development of new materials based on these findings, as well as analysis of the effects of strong correlation and disorder on the physical properties of superconducting and magnetic materials. |
| Nobuo Furukawa | Analysis of physical properties and material design of superconducting and magnetic materials | |
| Yuzo Shigesato | Development of methods for producing functional thin films and evaluation of their physical properties | Despite its industrial importance, there has been little systematic research into functional thin films, but this group has conducted research activities that clearly define academic significance while focusing on industrial usefulness. |
| Yujiro Nagata | Creation of new intermetallic compounds and oxides | This group is characterized by discoveries of new materials that can be considered truly impactful research in the fields of physics and chemistry, and has made new discoveries in fields such as magnetic materials, superconducting materials, intermetallic compounds, and hydrogen functional materials. |
| Tokio Nakata | Creation of highly efficient thin-film solar cells | This group aimed to create thin-film solar cells with a conversion efficiency of 20% or more, and conducted research on both solar cell materials and device structures. |
| Osamu Hashimoto | Creation of electromagnetic environment and its applications | Through the creation and improvement of the electromagnetic environment, we extracted and clarified the material properties required for the device for both industry and academia, expanded the scope of the device configuration technology to system applications, and worked with industry to improve the level of completion to the point of incorporating it into a system. |
| Atsuhito Sawabe | Development of large-area, high-quality diamond substrates with a diameter of 1 inch that can be used for electronic devices | We tackled the issue of wafer fabrication, which is extremely important for the diamond industry, head-on, and fabricated a 1-inch diameter heteroepi-growth substrate using Ir, which was invented before the COE activities, as a base material. |
| Mikio Takemoto | Characterization of CVD diamond | The objective of these two groups is to develop new laser application techniques and nano-, meso-, and macro-indentation measurement methods to accurately measure the mechanical properties of hard surface modification films and micro-materials. Using these methods, they have precisely measured the elastic stiffness, residual stress, and adhesive strength of high-quality diamond thin films, and evaluated the mechanical and strength properties of electronic device joints. |
| Takeshi Ogawa | Material strength and reliability evaluation using indentation method |
Educational Program Initiatives
| 1) Implement reforms to improve education at the 21st Century COE Program Graduate School. | (1) Graduate School of Science and Engineering will consolidate its five majors into one, provide interdisciplinary education, and cultivate scientists and engineers with broad perspectives. |
| (2) Develop research and education in interdisciplinary areas and promote the integration of science and engineering. | |
| (3) Nurturing researchers who can play an active role internationally. | |
| (4) Build a flexible organization that can quickly respond to developments and changes in academic fields. | |
| 2) We will improve the support system for COE fellows and create an environment in which doctoral students can concentrate on their research and studies. | |
| 3) Nurturing young researchers who can play an active role internationally. | (1) Provide education to improve the English language skills of young researchers. |
| (2) Actively encourage young researchers to participate in research conferences and collaborative research both in Japan and overseas. | |
| 4) By establishing a multidisciplinary frontier course, we aim to foster young researchers with broad perspectives that are not limited by their fields of expertise. | |
Program Outcomes
In order to carry out the COE project extremely efficiently, the university has mobilized all of its resources to carry out organizational reforms, and to strengthen its support system, reforms have been made to the university organization, administrative support system, and student support system.
| 1) University organizational reform |
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| 2) Administrative support system | A COE secretariat that provides full support for this program was established in the Research Support Unit of our university. This unified all contact points for this program and established an efficient administrative support system. The administrative side provided extremely efficient support for all projects held and implemented in this program, including the regular publication of newsletters (issued up to issue 8), the implementation of an English education (clinic) program for COE research assistants, the implementation of COE seminars for young researchers, the hosting of COE workshops, and the hosting of COE international symposiums (held a total of six times).
By establishing an intellectual property collaboration organization within the school corporation, it will be possible to speed up future research and development. |
| 3) Student support system | A support and subsidy system has been established for postdoctoral and doctoral students, allowing them to devote themselves to research under the guidance of their respective supervisors. The amount of subsidy for postdoctoral students is based on that for JSPS Research Fellows (PD), and for doctoral students it is based on that for JSPS Research Fellows (DC). Social security is treated the same as for general staff at the university, with social insurance covered by the Private School Mutual Aid Association and faculty and staff health checkups available, ensuring a thorough system of health management. Going forward, we will discuss with the school corporation specific measures for maintaining the current system and strive to establish an even better support system. |