To achieve a high degree of connection between the living organisms and cyberspace, we will create a biocompatible and information-compatible interface that seamlessly connects the surface of edge devices in cyberspace and living organisms. To promote this, we will establish a new research platform by expanding molecular nanotechnology, fosters the seeds of industry-academia collaboration toward the realization of biocompatible and information-compatible electronic devices, and rapidly develop this new field.

　The world in the next 20 to 30 years will become a society in which the computing power of the digital world infiltrates the real world and the real world and cyberspace will merge, AI will be used everywhere, and people's lives will become more prosperous and safer. This fusion will also occur in the biological/human body and cyberspace.　Academia and industry must work together to prepare for this.

　5-10 years from now: Establish a basic research platform for biocompatible and information-compatible interfaces.
After 15 years: Realization of bio-device symbiosis through "biocompatibility and information compatibility.
After 30 years: Standardization of digital and real-space interfaces.

First, we will establish a basic research platform for the creation of biocompatible and information-compatible interfaces in 5 to 10 years. We will establish a basis for academic and industry-academia collaboration to realize an interface that is friendly to both living organisms and devices, has a transducer function that freely converts signals from both at the same time, and can metabolize and regenerate itself.
To this goal, the following three activities will be conducted.
(1) Information collection and discussion: Search for and discuss bio- and information-compatible materials, including polymers and nanomaterials based on molecular nanotechnology, as well as metabolic molecular assemblies and cells, to clarify the necessary and sufficient conditions for bio- and information-compatibility and to establish the basis for academic studies.
(2) Fostering industry-academia collaboration: To deepen exchanges within the industry committee members and with academic members to create the seeds for industry-academia collaboration toward open innovation and real devices. Open the door for industrialization by developing and expanding from the search for sensors, actuators, signal processing, and biocompatible materials to the realization of artificial living tissues and cell stimulators.
(iii) Cultivation of new fields and young researchers' diversity: Engage promising young researchers and gender-diverse researchers. Through small group activities, establish an interdisciplinary "bio-molecular-nanotechnology fusion" research group that develops bio-cyberspace signal compatibility into an academic discipline, leading to its continuous development.

April 2022 to March 2027

Academia: 27　　Industry: 19　　Total membership: 46

Ichiro Yamashita
Specially Appointed Professor
Osaka University