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Purpose of Research

In the 21st century, Japan is facing a variety of serious problems such as a declining total and labor population due to a rapidly declining birth rate and aging, de-industrialization of domestic industries and relative stagnation of industrial development due to low economic growth, and the collapse of confidence in the idea of communal safety due to large, relatively recent natural disasters. Mechatronics and robot technologies, which have particularly high international competitiveness, are expected to develop as science and technology solutions that contribute to the resolution of the aforementioned problems from the viewpoints of supporting acts and providing a labor force, as well as substituting for people to carry out work in a dangerous environment. On the other hand, since this is a cross-sectional field based on a very wide range of engineering disciplines, not only is the independent development of fundamental engineering fields such as mechanical engineering and electrical engineering important, but the development and deepening of the entire field through a high level of coordination between these fields is indispensable for technological advancement. There are many mechatronics and robot researchers who are focused on different fundamental engineering fields such as mechanical engineering and electrical engineering at the engineering research institute of our university, and they have been carrying out research and teaching activities at a high international level. Therefore, by strengthening the organic cooperation between researchers and industries, etc., through this research center, we aim to further improve the international competitiveness of this university in this field and aim to contribute to the society by introducing state-of-the-art technology into the industry.

Research content / methods

The main feature of this research center is that researchers from different engineering fields such as the Department of Mechanical Engineering / Material Science and from the Department of Mathematics / Electronics and Information Sciences, gather and conduct interdisciplinary cooperative research activities. In addition, as an approach to translate the research achievements obtained at this center back to education in the field of engineering, it is important to have the achievements reflected not only in the content of each of the courses at the various schools of science and the engineering departments, but also in the pedagogy of the robotics and mechatronics minor program. This would allow us to strive to educate the next generation of human resources with an interdisciplinary perspective in this field.

　We will cover a wide range of contents related to this field ranging from fundamental elementary technology research to applied research as follows.

① Motion control (system operational control technology)

② Actuator (Electric-mechanical energy conversion technology, actuation technology)

③ Power electronics (Technology to convert electric energy)

④ Sensors (sensing technology, signal-processing technology)

⑤ System integration (e.g., Integrated / applied technology as a system, such as machinery, industrial manipulator, surgery-supporting robot, bipedal walking robot, intelligent wheelchair, electric car, electric railway, and man / machine interface.）