Report of the Sixth Workshop on the Ultra-Steel

On Tuesday, May 21, the Ultra-Steel workshop was held at the Tsukuba International Congress Center. NIMS had just completed the first stage of the ultra-steels project and was beginning its second stage; therefore, its speakers presented reports on "Achievements of the first stage" and "Research targets and strategy of the second stage". A panel discussion entitled "New Structural Steels and New Design of Constructions" followed the reports. The major results obtained during the first stage were presented at the poster session in view of the second stage's plan.

Poster Session

Although it was only a one-day workshop since it was held jointly with ICASS, over 300 people participated. There were also over 40 researchers from abroad, and enthusiastic discussions in English were noticeable at the poster sessions. With the motto "Using It makes It Material", the main feature of this workshop was to provide a place in which the researchers and engineers from the user's side and the maker's side could share their knowledge and information. Construction-related researchers and engineers were able to have debates at the afternoon's panel discussion.

The chairman of the panel discussion, Professor Masao Toyoda (Osaka University) left quite an impression with the following summary at the end of session. The catch phrases "Seeds to Needs" and "How To Use from How To Make" can be linked to all of the lectures in this panel discussion. In other words, we are talking about how to expand the market. Furthermore, if we had to choose between "materials" and "structure", priority should be given to the "structure". From now on, the cooperation and the integration of related technology will become much more important.

	Plenary Session

The ultra-steels research has been progressing with the workshops, and I would like to recall the transitions that have occurred. The table shows that the topic for each workshop was chosen based on the advancement of the project at the time of the workshop. The researchers and engineers from the user's side started appearing at the fourth workshop. They consider the workshop as the one and only "place that the researchers on the user's and maker's sides can interact" regarding the ultra-steels material. The participation of foreign researchers started at around the same time and provoked the organization of the "International Conference on Advanced Structural Steels ICASS". I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to these people for their contribution.

In our ultra-steels research, we will make efforts to develop specific products in our related projects. Furthermore, a decision has been made to hold international conferences on advanced structural steels every other year in China, Korea, and Japan. (The details will be provided in the next issue) In the midst of these circumstances, we believe that new methods and efforts are necessary to make this workshop a place for "scientific discussions", "user maker collaboration", and "international collaboration". We would appreciate your frank opinion on this subject. The proceedings of this workshop are still available. If you would like a copy or would like to express your opinions regarding the workshop, please contact

(Chairman of the Exchange Promotion Committee: Kaneaki Tsuzaki)