Institutefor the Physics and Mathematicsof the Universe
September 27, 2007
Vision by the Director, Hitoshi Murayama, University of California, Berkeley
The Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe is a unique research centerin the world that spans from pure mathematics to theoretical physics, to experimental
physics, astronomy, and applied mathematics. We address big questions about theuniverse, its fundamental laws, its beginning, its fate, and its mysterious components,
such as Dark Matter and Dark Energy. For this purpose, we will create new mathematics
needed for the unified description of the universe. It will enable new physical theories
with testable predictions. Technological innovations follow to make new experiments
possible; whose data will further stimulate development in mathematics. This upward
spiral will move the science forward, exciting the public at large and motivating students
to enter mathematics, science, and engineering to become the next-generation workforce.

1. Introduction
As far back as the history goes, human beings have always pondered about the origin of
the universe, how it is structured, how it works, and where it is going. The study of theuniverse is the most ancient science and most fundamental. By using modern technology
and development of theoretical framework, we can now address the ancient questions thatwere once studied only by pure thought. This Institute is nothing but an attack on theultimate questions of humans:(1) How did the universe start?
(2) What is the universe made of?
(3) What is the fate of the universe?
(4) What are its fundamental laws?
(5) Why do we exist?
There is no doubt that they are truly fundamental, worthwhile, yet extremely challenging
questions. Answers to these questions are what Einstein once dreamed about in his questof the “unified field theory.” The Institute we propose is aimed squarely at the unified
description of the universe, based on multi-disciplinary framework that combines physics,
astronomy, and mathematics. It will be a unique research center in the world that spansthe disciplines from mathematics to experimental physics addressing the big questions
about the universe. In addition, the list of the Principal Investigators we managed toassemble will be a magnet to attract more world-leading scientists to the Institute asvisitors and collaborators. There is a good potential that the Institute will uncover a newparadigm of the universe based on a new mathematical framework and new precision
data developed by the participating scientists.

2. Science
My vision of the Institute is a multiprong but coherent attack on thefundamental questions about theuniverse. It is based on three broad
experimental approaches, tied together
with two common threads.

2.1 Why Physics andMathematics?
The reason for the combination of physics, mathematics, and astronomy is quite obvious.
It has been the case, and will be for the foreseeable future, that mathematics is thefoundation for all sciences. Physics and astronomy are the most quantitative amongsciences and rely heavily on the most advanced types of mathematics. At the same time,
the need to build cutting-edge theories in physics sparked inspiration among
mathematicians, often opening new directions in mathematics research as evidenced byrecent Fields medals.
The fundamental impact of mathematics on our understanding of the universe is welldescribed in this quote from Galileo Galilei: “Philosophy is written in this grand book – Imean the Universe – which stands continually open to our gaze, but it cannot be
understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and interpret thecharacters in which it is written. It is written in the language of mathematics, without
which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of.”This type of cross-development has been an important strength of science in Japan, andsome of the best practitioners in this area are represented as Principal Investigators of theInstitute. The Institute will provide a meeting place for physicists and mathematicians
interested in fundamental questions of the universe. It will enhance their interaction,
nurture young talents, and help secure future progress of mathematical and physicalsciences in Japan. New theories of physics developed with help of mathematics provide
further motivation to use the universe as a whole as a laboratory, requiring advances inastronomy. Conversely, data from astrophysical observations have been the key impetus
to develop deep insight into the inner workings of the universe since the time ofCopernicus, Newton, to Einstein and today.

2.2 The Three Experimental Approaches
Let me briefly review what we know
about what the universe is made of. For
centuries, humans had believed that theentire universe is made of the samematerial we are made of, namely atoms.
In the past decade, this belief wascompletely overturned. The atoms makeup less than 5% of the universe. The dark
matter comprises the rest of the matter, about 23% of the universe, yet we do not knowwhat it is. The remainder of about 72% is dark energy that is supposed to be responsible
for the accelerated expansion of the universe. We know even less about what darkenergy is. In addition to the discovery that there are unknown components in theuniverse, there are also mysteries about the components that should exist yet we don’t
find. Anti-matter can be created in the laboratory and was surely created in Big Bang.
Yet we do not see it in the universe. In addition, we know the universe issuperconducting and makes certain kinds of forces short-ranged within a billionth of ananometer while keeping electromagnetism and gravity long-ranged. The energy densityof the superconductor should contribute about 1062% to that of the universe, which must
be cancelled by yet another component at an incredible accuracy. All of theseobservations cry out for a new paradigm of the universe, and hence new physics and newmathematics.

a) Underground
One broad experimental approach to address these questions is underground experiments
for rare processes. This is precisely where Japan is leading the world and we can buildon the existing strength. Prof. Koshiba won 2002 Nobel prize in physics for his discoveryof neutrinos from the supernova 1987A, a massive star that had reached its end of life
with a tremendous explosion as bright as an entire galaxy. He demonstrated thatneutrinos can be used to study the universe in a way not imagined before with the
Kamiokande detector. The SuperKamiokande and KamLAND experiments running rightnow undoubtedly lead the world in this area, addressing fundamental questions about theuniverse and the unified theory behind it. To a great surprise to the scientific community,
they discovered that ghostly neutrinos have tiny but finite masses at the level predicted by
the unified theories at 13 orders of magnitude beyond the reach of the current accelerator
experiments. Thus, the neutrino masses are giving us a precious glimpse of physics at theultra-high energy and very early universe.
I anticipate this tradition will continue, because the underground science is far from overbut is actually flourishing. For example, underground experiments are likely avenues todiscover the dark matter of the universe. While dark matter makes up most of the massof the Galaxy, its nature remains a mystery. It is perhaps ironic that the best way to study
the universe is to go underground. Another example is the discovery of a new type ofneutrino mixing at SuperKamiokande with a neutrino beam from the J-PARC accelerator
in Tokai village. It opens a novel way to attack the mystery why we exist in the universeat all, namely the preponderance of matter over anti-matter.

b) SkyOn the other hand, the experimental approach to look up at the sky is undoubtedly a very
essential one. Both in ground-based and space-based observations, we have made great
strides in recent years. For instance, we have determined the breakdown of thecomposition of the universe. In addition to the unknown dark matter component, theuniverse is dominated by the dark energy that is even less understood. It is ripping theuniverse apart, and appears to be an infinite source of energy. Large-scale galaxy surveys,
in particular aimed at the baryonic acoustic oscillations that would precisely determine
how quickly the dark energy generates energy, more detailed studies of cosmic
microwave background, in particular aimed at the B-mode polarization that would
determine the energy scale of the inflation, and advanced computing for sophisticateddata analysis will further revolutionize our understanding of the universe. Japan iscatching up with the Americans and Europeans in this area, and is poised to make criticaladvances thanks to the new Subaru telescope.

c) Accelerator
Finally the most direct assault on the mysteries of the universe comes from the bruteforce method that tries to recreate the Big Bang in the laboratory, namely particle
accelerators. They smash microscopic particles at ever increasing energies to mimic the
Big Bang in a “Little Bang” that brings us direct and critical information on the conditionat the birth of the universe. Japan leads the world in construction and operation ofparticle accelerators as evidenced by the incredible success of KEK-B; it beats the closest
competitor in the US by more than a factor of three in its performance. This year, the newhighest energy accelerator, LHC, starts operation in Europe, and Japan is an essential
member of this frontier science. It contributed both financially and technologically. On
the other hand, Japan needs to be stronger in the large-scale data analysis with increased
human resources, exploiting the precious data set, competing with the European center, toensure a successful future in this area.
Note that the Institute funds will not be used to subsidize the existing experimental
programs with these three approaches that are already funded through competitive grants.
Instead, the Institute will maximize the scientific output from these programs by freeing
up time of PIs from duties to focus on research, hiring postdocs and termed professors to
add personnel for data analyses, and start development work for future projects withsmall seed money.

2.3 Common Threads
It is clear to me that the mysteries of the universe can be revealed only through the multiprong experimental assault on these three fronts: underground, sky, and accelerator. The
Institute we propose will push all of these approaches in a realistic manner that builds onthe current strengths of science in Japan. On the other hand, this push will not succeed
without common threads that tie them together. The threads I envision are theoreticalphysics that is closely tied with the highly advanced mathematics, and instrumentation
and applied mathematics that can be shared by the disparate experimental approaches.
Theoretical physics aims to develop the unified description of the universe based on theavailable data, and allows us to guide the future plans for next-generation experiments.
To tackle the challenging mystery at the birth of the universe, new types of highlysophisticated mathematics will be needed. The multi-disciplinary fusion of physics,
mathematics, and astronomy, therefore, will be crucial for the success of the Institute.
Japan has a long-standing tradition in this area, starting from the past Nobel prizes
awarded to Yukawa and Tomonaga. Historically, many critical advances in mathematics
came from the need to formulate important questions in physics, and this tradition
continues to date. I envision the effort to come up with unified understanding of theuniverse at its most fundamental level would require new mathematics not available
today; it will spark inspiration among world-leading mathematicians of the Institute tolaunch new directions in mathematics. At the same time, world-leading theoreticalphysicists at the Institute will benefit from such new directions and use them in theireffort to build the unified theory of the universe.
In addition, applied mathematics and statistics would provide novel approach to deal withhuge data set provided from next-generation experiments. The future data from galaxy
surveys, accelerator and underground data will be measured in Pentabytes (billion
Megabytes) and pose an incredible challenge in extracting critical scientific informationout of them. Recently new methodologies such as neural networks, boosted decision tree,
and Markov chain Monte Carlo, have been applied to large data set; on the other hand,the need to deal with such a huge data set inspires applied mathematicians to discoverfurther innovative methodologies. For example, there is need to treat geometric objects,
such as event displays and galaxy images, on a statistical bases. The “stochastic
geometry” that addresses these needs has been hampered by a slow progress in part due
to the lack of specific problems to attack. The data from experiments the Institute willdeal with provide specific problems and boost progress in developing new methodologies
in this new area of mathematics/statistics. This way, the Institute will cope with datafrom disparate experimental efforts that nonetheless benefit from this common problem
and interaction with mathematicians.
Furthermore, new experimental ideas emerge from the interaction of theorists andexperimentalists, which would require “try-outs” at small scales to refine the ideas before
they can be proposed as realistic projects. Sharing expertise and experience ininstrumentation and data analysis will be the key, and small amounts of “seed money”
supported by the Institute will kick-start the actual development work. Once thedevelopment work matures, the PIs will seek support from competitive grants for theactual experiments. The initial examples will include development of multi-fiber
spectrograph for future large-scale spectroscopic galaxy surveys, phototubes and ultralow
background environment for future underground experiments. As a highly technologicalcountry, Japan surely can provide leadership in this area.
This way, theory/pure mathematics and instrumentation/applied mathematics provide two
critical common threads to the three broad experimental approaches mentioned above.
Putting them together, I believe this Institute will provide an exciting environment thatbuilds on the current strengths in the Japanese scientific scene, makes a strong push inthree broad experimental approaches, yet provides critical common threads to keep thediverse activity coherent.
This kind of Institute will be truly unique in the world. Kavli Institute for Theoretical
Physics is a fantastic place, yet does only theoretical physics. There are many first-rateinstitutions that combine research in mathematics and theoretical physics, such as Isaac
Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences in Cambridge, Institute for Advanced Studyin Princeton, IHES in France, such as MSRI in Berkeley, but none of them include
experimental physics in their program. There are also great institutions on boththeoretical and experimental physics, such as CERN, Fermilab, SLAC, KEK, but none ofthem have mathematicians. The combination of science this Institute will include should
attract best people from the world because of its uniqueness and potential for major
breakthroughs.

3. Synergy of Mathematics and Physics
Since it may not be obvious how exactly mathematics and physics can stimulate eachother’s progress, I’d like to describe some background behind this anticipated fruitfulfusion based on historical examples with an emphasis on the role played by our members.
The search for the fundamental laws of Nature requires inventing new mathematics, andit has inspired many important developments in mathematics. For example,
approximately 40% of Fields Medalists in mathematics since 1990 have worked in areas
closely related to quantum field theory and string theory. No other area of science has had
such a great impact on mathematics in the past few decades, and the rate of progress inthis area suggests that this trend will only accelerate in future. At the same time, newtheoretical tools developed by mathematicians have had an enormous impact on progressof particle physics. For example, they have enabled physicists to evaluate strongly
coupled effects in quantum field theory and string theory at the level that was
unimaginable 20 years ago.
In the past couple of decades, remarkable progress has been made in applications ofstring theory to problems in geometry. The mirror symmetry, predicted by physicists andproven by mathematicians, gave a powerful tool to compute Gromov-Witten invariants ofsymplectic manifolds. Moreover, collaborations of mathematicians and physicists haveuncovered surprising relations of these computations to gauge theory instantons,
integrable statistical systems, and combinatorics. Currently, this is one of the most active
areas in geometry, and its progress has lead to two Fields Medals in mathematics(Kontsevich and Okounkov).
Hirosi Ooguri has been one of the leaders in this area in physics, and he has used
Gromov-Witten invariants and related mathematics to address fundamental questions in
the unification and quantum gravity. I have also identified another mathematical physicist,
who has made important contributions in this area, as a candidate for a mid-career
member in residence at Kashiwa. The candidate is currently a faculty member in a joint
appointment in mathematics and physics at a major research university abroad with anextensive record of collaborations with both mathematicians and physicists. Moreover,there are mathematics faculty members in Komaba, who have worked on Gromov-Witten
invariants and related mathematics. Kontsevich and Nekrasov of IHES, France have also
agreed to be collaborative researchers of the Institute. I expect that the Institute will leadthe world in this area.
Arguably, the most famous example of discovery of new mathematics inspired byphysics is the simultaneous invention of Calculus and Newton’s Mechanics. In this case,precise mathematical formulations of infinitesimal and continuity were essential. Looking
forward to future, I expect that developing tools to analyze systems with infinite
dimensional degrees of freedom – infinite analysis – will play an equally important rolein mathematics and physics of the 21st century.
QCD, which describes strong interactions of elementary particles, is an example of an
infinite dimensional system. In 2000, the Clay Mathematics Institute posed Seven
Millennium Problems. One of them is an existence proof of QCD with a demonstration of
its confinement property since it is expected that its solution would totally alter our viewof the short-distance frontier in physics while opening up new and fertile ground formathematical research. Another example of infinite analysis would be stringy geometry.
Traditionally, mathematicians have studied geometric objects with a point-like object as aprobe. String, as being an object extended in space, would provide a new perspective ingeometry. This has already been evidenced in the mirror symmetry and Gromov-Witten
invariant, discussed in the above. But, I think they are just tips of a big iceberg and more
will come from this direction in mathematics. Mathematical tools developed in this area
would enable physicists to derive more robust predictions from string theory.
Infinite analysis is also relevant to statistics of geometrical objects. For example,
techniques of conformal field theory have been used to study stochastic geometry of selfavoiding random walks – the citation of Fields Medal to Werner last year. Research inthis direction may lead to new tools to analyze geometric data from astrophysicalobservations and accelerator physics experiments.
In the late 80’s and early 90’s, collaborations between mathematicians and physicists inJapan interested in infinite analysis were very strong. In the early 90's, JSPS funded agrant in this interdisciplinary area at the level of $9M for 4 years. Some of PI's of this
proposal, Jimbo, Kohno, and Tsuchiya of mathematics and Ooguri of physics, were PI'sof this JSPS project. This was an enormous success, and produced several important joint
projects between mathematicians and physicists. It also helped to identify and nurture
new talents in mathematics and theoretical physics. In particular, at least 10 physics
graduate students, who have grown up in this environment, subsequently moved tomathematics and received faculty appointments in mathematics departments of major
universities in Japan. I myself grew up in this exciting environment as a graduate student
at University of Tokyo, and my very first two publications in 1988-9 concerned withconnections between physics and mathematics following up on the Fields Medal paper byWitten.
Worldwide, this area at the interface of mathematics and physics has made a remarkable
stride in the past ten years. Yet, in Japan, collaborations between mathematicians andphysicists have somewhat weakened in the same period. I have re-assembled many of
the original members of the JPSP project, by attracting Ooguri from Caltech and byincluding Jimbo, Kohno and Tsuchiya as PI's of mathematics. They will re-ignite
collaborations of mathematicians and physicists, and I expect that their efforts will lead toa new paradigm of mathematics and physics in the 21st century.

4. Discovery scenarios and Deliverables
I foresee unprecedented cross-pollination within
the Institute that can be explained in a few likely
examples. This type of advancement will go in
an upward “spiral” that brings mathematics,
physics, and astronomy together.

4.1 Initial Activities
I see the initial activities of the Institute focusing
on the following areas.
•••

New galaxy surveys that address natureof dark energy, which may exclude thequantum vacuum energy as its source andrequire a new dynamics in quantum field
theory.
Improved understanding of neutrino
parameters that constrain unified theories,
dynamics of supernova explosions, andorigin of matter
Exploitation of the coming LHC data

•

•

•
•

jointly by experimentalists and theorists that may reveal new forces andsymmetries of nature that existed at the birth of the universe.
Development of new underground experiments that may establish the dark matterin our galactic halo as a new kind of elementary particle and let us see inside theEarth using neutrinos.
Full understanding of the behavior of quantum field theories in the strong-coupled
regime, one of the “Millennium Problems” of the Clay Mathematics Institute,using methods of integrable systems and through equivalence of quantum field
theories to the theory of gravity, i.e. the AdS/CFT correspondence.
Developments of new tools in geometry that help us understand the full scope ofsolutions to the string theory.
Discovery of new algorithms that allow us to extract science from Pentabyte-scaleastrophysical data about dark energy.

4.2 Potential Deliverables
Even though it cannot be predicted precisely what the Institute will deliver, I can describe
a few potential scenarios of exciting research output from the Institute:•••

Consistent picture of the dark matter of the universe among the data from theunderground detection experiments in Kamioka and from the advanced analysesof LHC data, based on new mathematical techniques developed at the Institute.
The Institute theorists provide a framework to explain this diverse data set,
making predictions of neutrino and gamma ray signals that spark newexperimental effort. At the same time, new effort is launched to incorporate the
newly gained information on dark matter into the unified theory. New
mathematical tools are developed at the Institute to let physicists build a candidate
unified theory out of the string theory and to derive its experimental predictions.
At the same time, these tools are used by the Institute mathematicians to define
new invariants of manifolds and help them solve outstanding problems ingeometry.
Large-scale galaxy surveys reveal the properties of the dark energy that
accelerates the expansion of the universe. A large-scale computing developed byapplied mathematicians of the Institute will allow them to explore the “landscape”
of solutions to the string theory, which show a large fraction of them exhibits thesame behavior of the dark energy as the data suggest. It will show that the fate of
the universe is not the accelerated expansion forever, but rather a quantum
tunneling of the universe to a state with slower expansion by the formation of
bubbles in a several billions of years from now.
Another outcome from the galaxy surveys is the measurement of the spectral
index, which constrains the models of inflation. Time-dependent solutions to thestring theory, such as the inflationary universe, are not well understood. Institutephysicists join forces with experts of integrable systems in mathematics todevelop a new mathematical framework to describe these solutions. Throughcollaboration among astrophysical, particle, and string theorists, it is found that••

the data severely limit the possible solutions from the string theory, and makes
further predictions on the cosmological data, in particular tensor-mode density
fluctuation that will be pursued by new initiatives at the Institute. In addition, thevast data from the next-generation galaxy surveys nudge the appliedmathematicians and statisticians to develop a novel method to extract subtle
information from the last data set, uncovering an unanticipated new behavior of
Dark Energy.
Institute supports data analysis of the next-generation neutrino experiments,
which discover a new type of neutrino mixing. It influences the study ofsupernova explosions to see if they are responsible for the formation of trans-ironelements on the Earth. In addition, it also completes the information about thestructure of fermion masses and mixings, and it constraints compactifications of
the string theory. It further points to the possible origin of our existence throughthe topological transitions in gauge theories.
Combination of possible discoveries such as the ultimate instability of all matter,
hints of multiverse, and ever accelerating expansion of the universe will reach themind of public at large, influencing the society in its philosophical, spiritual, as
well as religious sectors.

4.3 Assembled membership to achieve our goals
For the membership, I believe we have managed to assemble an amazing group of worldleading, not just world-class, scientists.
We already have the world-leading core group working on underground experiments, led
by Yoichiro Suzuki, Takaaki Kajita, Masayuki Nakahata, and Kunio Inoue. Hank Sobel
from Irvine and Stavros Katsanevas from Paris further boost the strength of this group.
As for the “sky” approach, we have a core strength in hardware and data acquisition
represented by Masataka Fukugita and Hiroaki Aihara, and on large-scale datainterpretation by Naoshi Sugiyama. David Spergel from Princeton has successfully
extracted science from the huge WMAP data set and is involved in Hyper Suprime-Cam
at Subaru, and Ken’ichi Nomoto provides much-needed expertise in stellar dynamics. On
the accelerator side, Aihara’s hardware skill needs to be matched with the simulation anddata analysis effort. I myself will be heavily involved in building a group of theorists
studying the data from the LHC. We have identified a candidate experimental physicist
dedicated on the LHC research as well as a candidate theoretical physicist studying thesignal of various new theories at the LHC to be appointed at the Associate Professor levelto further strengthens this area and improve standing of the Japanese group overall.
Tsutomu Yanagida will pursue unified theories locally, and also by Ooguri from Caltech,
who is a world-expert on the string theory, the best candidate for the unified theory.
Akihiro Tsuchiya, who is a former chairman of Mathematics Department of Nagoya
University, will join the Institute. He has an extensive record of conducting research at
the interface of mathematics and physics as well as organizing research groups in thisarea. With Ooguri, he will spearhead the math/physics collaboration at the Institute.

Local mathematicians Michio Jimbo and Toshitake Kohno are experts in exactly solvablesystems and in geometry, respectively, and they will add further strengths to build
collaboration between mathematicians and physicists to develop new mathematicalframeworks towards the unified theory.
We have already identified collaborators(including mathematicians in Kyoto Tetsuji Miwa and Hiraku Nakajima, with trackrecords in successful collaborations with physicists, YITP Director Tohru Eguchi, and a
Fields medalist Konsevitch, and Nikita Nekrasov from IHES) to further strengthen thisarea. Cosmological theories in inflation and Big Bang itself are well covered by
Katsuhiko Sato, one of the initiators of the inflation theory.
I had a personal experience at the tail end of the Center for Particle Astrophysics (CfPA)in Berkeley, which was an NSF-funded Science and Technology Center for ten years, aswell as Berkeley Center for Theoretical Physics, in which I was deeply involved inbuilding up. I’ve learned two important lessons for a success of a multi-disciplinary
institute of this type. One is that the postdocs provide the “free-streaming glue” to theInstitute. They do not have duties to teach or serve on committees, yet are curious
enough to move from one research group to another, and bring the Principal Investigatorsfrom varied subfields together. In addition, bringing the top-notch researchers from theworld as visitors and workshop participants is the key to inspire postdocs and educate
graduate students to take the maximum benefit from the Institute. The other is to provide
an inviting atmosphere for casual interactions through an open architecture of the facility,
which naturally draws people out of their offices into the interaction area to exchange
ideas and have discussions. Especially in Japan where people tend to be shy about
discussing not-so-well-fleshed-out ideas because they do not want to be embarrassed,
encouraging interactions with the mutual understanding that “no questions and ideas arestupid” is a must for a successful Institute.

5. Management
The Director who is ultimately responsible for all decisions about personnel, finances,infrastructure, instrumentation, computing, and outreach will manage the Institute.
Yoichiro Suzuki and Hiroaki Aihara will serve as Deputy Directors to assist the Director
in day-to-day operations of the Institute. The Administrative Director, Kenzo Nakamura,
will conduct business under the supervision and guidance of the Deputy Directors. He
will oversee all expenditures, administrative duties, and facilitate the activity of thescientists using a group of assistant administrators. This is a wonderful team both fromscientific and administrative points of view, and I’m confident that they will provide allneeded help to me to run the Institute.
The Scientific Advisory Committee (SAC) to the Director consists of four to five PIs of
his choice. They advise the Director on the appropriate budget planning as well as
scientific directions. The role is strictly advisory; the Director makes the final decisions.
The PIs have a large autonomy in the research they conduct. Their research is fundedthrough competitive grants, but they can propose hiring of postdocs and termedprofessors to the Director in order to carry out their research. The Director’s approval on
the proposed appointments will reflect the scientific vision and priorities set by the
Director, who consults the SAC as needed.
We will form the External Advisory Board (EAB) which will review the scientificactivities of the Institute and give advise to the Director on the scientific priorities and theresearch activities annually to keep the Institute stay on the course of the proposedscience.
In addition to the role to manage and lead the Institute, I anticipate that the Director will
be busy recruiting the best young talents to the Institute as well as informing the scientificcommunity about our contributions.

6. Organization
The Institute must achieve a fine balance between two conflicting requirements. One
requirement is to give as much time and autonomy to individual Principal Investigators tocarry out their research plans with sufficient financial support to hire postdocs, invite
visiting professors, and organize workshops in their respective fields. The other is tomake sure that investigators from different subfields learn to speak each other’s language
and seek for mutual inspiration, through organized seminars, workshops, and a visitor
program. It is a big challenge to meet both requirements and the Institute is committed
to achieve this goal.
One essential ingredient is the new building on the Kashiwa campus of University ofTokyo. Borrowing from the future overhead money thanks to the generosity of the
University administration, we plan to build an infrastructure that would make it easy for
researchers to meet each other and exchange new ideas. The architecture will follow thestyle of Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics at UC Santa Barbara and Center for
Theoretical Physics at UC Berkeley with a large open area and amenities (i.e., ample
skylight, espresso machines, refrigerators, with all walls covered by blackboards tostimulate spontaneous discussions). It will provide an attractive and competitiveenvironment for researchers from around the world.
Tsuchiya and Saito will reside full-time in Kashiwa as Principal Investigators, and the
mid-career mathematical physicist we have identified, as mentioned in section 3, as well
as all postdocs in mathematics hired by the Institute will reside in Kashiwa, facilitatecommunication between physicists and mathematicians, and maintain activities in thisarea throughout the year.
There will be semi-annual workshops that bringmathematicians and physicists together where they will share their common problems.
We will also have regular tutorials on the problems, not results, between mathematicians
and physicists to break down the intellectual barriers. Once that is established, they willkeep communicating over phone and video on individual bases, visiting each other on asneeded basis, as well as organized seminars broadcast over the video to maintain mutualinterest. We will secure enough office space on the Kashiwa campus so that themathematicians from Komaba can drop in any time. We also plan to have a state-of-art

videoconference system and internet-blackboards between Kashiwa and Komaba thatstay on 24/7 to make impromptu discussions possible.
Most experimental physicists spend a good fraction of their time on the Kashiwa campus,
analyzing data, sharing seminars, developing new instruments, and discussing issues of
their mutual interest among each other as well as with the theoretical physicists andmathematicians. For the SuperKamiokande, XMASS, and T2K experiments, the Institutehosts the data analysis activities. For the HyperSprimeCam project at Subaru telescope,
the Institute will host a computing cluster that allows extensive numerical simulations
needed for the data analysis. We plan to hire Assistant Professors on the ATLAS
experiment who can frequently come back from CERN using the Institute travel funds,
have regular meetings with phenomenologists about new theoretical ideas, and giveschools to both theorists and experimentalists in Japan. It is also important to keep strong
ties between the Physics Department on the Hongo campus and the Institute. We plan toinclude faculty members in Hongo on joint appointments with the Institute to maintain
constant flow of researchers between the campuses.
External Advisory Board will review the activities of the Institute annually, where all the
PIs will be present. In addition, we plan to have annual Institute retreats that also have all
PIs participating. This way, we keep the diverse activities of the Institute coherent andwell informed among the entire spectrum of the PIs, that enables communication andcollaboration.
In the Kashiwa Institute building, we will have daily tea at 3pm and everybody isrequired to attend if they are in town. Individual or groups of PIs organize seminar series
that everybody is invited to attend. Long-duration workshops à la Kavli Institute for
Theoretical Physics and Aspen Center for Physics bring in visitors to further stimulate theintellectual activities and keep the Institute at the forefront of worldwide science.
I cannot leave Berkeley for the Fall 2007 semester because of the teaching
responsibilities. However I will be physically in Kashiwa at the earliest possible
occasion allowed by the system, namely January 2008. All the arrangements are being
made surprisingly quickly and smoothly. I have my full confidence in both Tokyo andBerkeley that everything will be properly arranged in time for my Directorship in January.

7. Broader Impact
The basic research in physics and mathematics to understand the universe at its deepest
level by itself would not have direct practical applications, unlike biomedical research or
nanotechnology development.
However, there are always young students who are
attracted to the most fundamental quest at its frontier, and historically they include someof the best and the brightest minds in each generation. Discoveries that address major
questions about the universe by the Institute scientists will undoubtedly inspire highschool and college students in Japan, which motivate them to study mathematics andsciences at large leading to the next-generation workforce. Uniquely to this Institute, we
anticipate cross-career development between mathematics and physics, such as astatistician moving to experimental physics. Needless to say, the questions the Institutewill ask are easy to relate to for any laymen. This connection between fundamental
research and education was highlighted, for example, by a recent National ResearchCouncil report, “Rising Above the Gathering Storm,” in the United States.
We put strong emphasis on diversity. Currently in Japan, the fraction of female full
professors in Physics Departments hover around 2-3 percents. We have currently one
female PI, which we will bring up soon to the 10% level. In addition, we promote ethnic
diversity with emphasis on Asian representation. We have already secured participationof strong physicists in India and are discussing collaborations with Chinese and Korean
institutions.
The Institute will promote public awareness of mathematics and physics through anorganized series of public lectures, collaboration with media on TV shows, and educationof students at the participating institutions. Japan has been quite effective incommunicating exciting discoveries in science and advances in technology to the publicat large, compared to similar efforts in the United States, inspiring young minds to enterscience and engineering. I myself have been involved in public outreach through easy-toread texts, radio shows, and public lectures. The Institute will further strengthen the
public outreach by major discoveries and concerted efforts by the Institute scientists.
In addition, we believe that much of the methodologies and technologies developed by
the research at the Institute will likely benefit the society. New methodologies to deal
with large-scale astrophysical and accelerator data will influence the study of financial
markets and biological data. New instruments developed to build next-generation
experiments will help the industry to acquire technology that will otherwise fall into thecracks of profit-oriented research. One such example is the development of 20-inch
photomultipliers that allowed a company to become the single-handedly dominant player
in the worldwide marketplace of phototubes, especially in medical applications. Future
development of neutrino detectors would allow monitoring of nuclear power plants.
Multi-fiber technique needed for future astrophysical surveys will likely lead to medical
applications of diagnosis and laser treatments.
An important impact of the Institute would be to reverse the “brain-drain” of the talented
scientists from Japan and bring some of them back. I myself am attracted to thisopportunity to design a research center according to my own vision, and also because theInstitute I envision is unique in the world. The fact that I have already managed to bring
Ooguri from Caltech, Sobel from Irvine, and Spergel from Princeton to join the Instituteas PIs, and identified more from abroad for the termed professorships, demonstrates how
attractive and unique the proposed Institute is. I am optimistic that the Institute will
attract even more researchers from the world to join the effort, redefine the boundaries
between mathematics and physics, and make it a truly leading and exciting research
center in the world.

8. Conclusions

This Institute is a unique research center in the world that spans from pure mathematics
to theoretical physics, to experimental physics, astronomy, and applied mathematics. Allof these elements must come together to address the big questions about the universe.
The Institute will create new mathematical framework motivated by the desire to explain
the precision data, which require new theories, for which no suitable mathematics exists.
In turn the new mathematics allow for new theories that spark technological innovations
to design new experiments. The Institute explores the uncharted territory at a crossroadsof Mathematics and Physics. This multiple-connected activities and inspiration will
move the science forward in an upward spiral. We make effort to inform the public atlarge about the new discoveries from the Institute, which will motivate students to enter
mathematics, science, and engineering to become the next-generation workforce. It willbring researchers from around the world, and turn Japan a unique place to advance thehuman knowledge on its most fundamental quest.