Research Center for Strategic Materials

Our society is set up with engineering materials, hence we must consider material resources. It is well known that we do not have enough raw ores in Japan. Thus we must conduct materials research from a view point of strategic natural resources of precious metals. It has been carried out by MEXT and METI especially for functional materials since 2007. NIMS will now focus on the new project with structural materials in addition to functional materials, because structural materials contain significant amount of rare metals. "Structural Materials Unit" is in charge of the research and development of advanced structural metallic materials without rare metal elements that can respond to demands at a time when natural resources are becoming depleted. Rare metal collection from a dilute solution is also investigated to utilize urban mine, which is conducted by "Materials Circulation Design Group".