Prof. Motoko Kotani, Director of WPI-Advance Institute for Materials Research (AIMR), Tohoku University, presented “Advancement of world-class research center: activities of WPI-AIMR.” Kotani is famous for her leadership in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) research and her achievements as a scientist. She is a pioneer in encouraging the careers of female researchers in Japan.

Her primary goal is to make WPI-AIMR a world-leading research institution by renovating the field of materials science with incorporation of mathematics. The WPI is a program designed by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) that aims to establish ‘globally visible’ research centers within Japan. AIMR was founded in 2007 as one of the original five WPI members. Since then, WPI-AIMR has contributed to achieve the four core missions of WPI, ‘Science’, ‘Globalization’, ‘Reform’, and ‘Fusion’, for 10 years. There are now nationwide thirteen WPI members, each promoting internationalization and elite science.

WPI-AIMR promoted quality research in the field of material science, with publication of a number of papers in high-impact journals. In addition, it has run overseas joint laboratories with three core partners among fifteen overseas alliance institutions. This collaboration aims to make a ‘hub of global brain circulation’ by conducting joint research projects and international meetings.
WPI-AIMR has also taken initiatives to share the academic resource to the community through works in collaboration laboratories with industry and the project center in Fraunhofer Institute for Electronic Nano Systems in Germany.

The most challenged mission for WPI-AIMR was creation of new scientific field by fusion of interdisciplinary research. WPI-AIMR is the first institution gathering mathematicians and experimental scientist in one laboratory to incorporate concepts and methods of mathematics into materials science. The primary question of material science is to reveal the structure and processing of materials with target functions. Integration of material science and mathematics, ‘discrete geometric analysis’ in particular, aimed to bring a new understanding of materials based on a hierarchical network and to find the relationship of function, structure, and process. Kotani and her colleagues exemplified it by a publication in Science in 2013, and since then, WPI-AIMR has promoted the tight relationship of mathematic theories, computation and experiment, and published emerging results. With the coming of ‘data-driven material science’, Kotani believes the conceptualization of data with mathematics to gain information, meaning, understanding, and wisdoms from big data.

At the end of her talk, Kotani stated that ‘high-efficient energy conversion & storage’ and ‘reliable materials for social infrastructure’ are crucial goals for establishing good relationship between basic research and the society, and that WPI-AIMR will be “heading to lead science and top-level innovation for a sustainable society” in Japan, with engagement of all material-science researchers in Tohoku University.