Information Devices
Professor NAKANO, Yoshiaki

Looking beyond publishing to developing advanced photoelectronic
devices with commercial applications

Interviewer: Takashi Mikuriya, professor̶̶ First of all, Professor Nakano, could you explain what yourThe upside is that I have a new frame of reference and I'm

research is about?

working under a completely different set of conditions thanbefore. Even though I'm basically doing the same thing, myMy specialization is called photoelectronics, which is an area

environment has changed. And because my environment hasof electrical engineering. In electronics, you have one fieldchanged, the way I look at what I'm doing has also changed,that uses LSI and other silicone semiconductors, and you

and my approach to things is different too. Since I was athave another ﬁeld making devices that emit and receive light

Hongo for so long I just kept on doing the same things inusing what are called compound semiconductors, which arepretty much the same way I always had. My environment

completely different from silicone semiconductors. This ﬁeld

didn't change all that much, so I only made incremental

is called photoelectronics. Semiconductor lasers are a typicaladjustments in response to developments in the world

example of a photoelectronic device, and that's what ourat large. But since moving here I've been thrown into a

research has been focused on for a long time. But recently

completely different environment and my way of thinking

we've realized that there's not much beneﬁt to just being able

has changed dramatically. I don't know how much longer I'll

to emit light--the real source of value is in taking that lightremain in academia, but in the end it's good to shake thingsand doing something with it. So now our focus is shiftingup every now and then. True, it's a big hassle to uproot one'sfrom laser semiconductors to more advanced light-controllinglab and all one's equipment, but apart from that I think there'sdevices such as optical switches and wavelength converters.

much to be gained in having a couple such transitions overthe course of one's academic career.

̶̶ Professor Nakano, you joined RCAST in April 2002, half ayear after the launch of the Super COE (Center of Excellence)

On the downside, the process of moving everything, especiallyProgram, isn't that right?

all my research equipment, has taken about a year, and I
suppose it's possible that the pace of my research has dropped

Yes, before that I was in the Electrical Engineering Department

off slightly in some respects. Also, since I teach at both Hongoat the Hongo campus for a long time. The thing that impressedand Komaba, sometimes I have to make two roundtrips a day

me most when I came to RCAST was that this is a place which

between the two campuses, so I spend more time to-ing andbrings together people from different disciplines. In particular,

fro-ing than I used to. On the other hand, it's good exercise

I found it refreshing to have the opportunity to meet(laughter)...so even that cloud has a sliver lining.

researchers from the humanities on a daily basis, somethingthat never happened in the Engineering Faculty. What
struck me is how this sort of interdisciplinary environment is

Rigorously assessing research results ineconomic terms

conducive to generating new things and new ideas.
̶̶ You said that your research has changed dramatically̶̶ What are the positives and negatives about working atsince coming to RCAST. What exactly do you mean?

RCAST? How does it compare to being at Hongo?

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The Super COE Program had already been in place forNo. Not at ﬁrst anyway (laugher). In academia everyone is on

about six months when I moved to RCAST, so joining it in

the save wavelength. We all know what's good, what's bad.

midstream, the ﬁrst thing I did was sit down and reexamine

We speak the same language. Now, working at RCAST on TBI

my own research goals to see how I could bring them moreand other projects, I have many opportunities to speak to

into line with the direction of Super COE. I tried to assimilate

lawyers, venture capitalists, people like that, which I didn't

my research into both the Open Laboratory and TBI projects.

when I was at Hongo. I've found that they have a completelyFirst, for the Open Laboratory, I put together a team ofdifferent way of looking at things and evaluating things. At

people from the university and private industry and devised afirst we couldn't understand one another. It's been good

platform whereby academia, industry, and government could

training both in terms of learning how to speak so that others

work together to solve the sticking points in photoelectrical

can understand me as well as how to interpret what they'reresearch that the IT industry had run into. Before the Opensaying.

Laboratory, Hongo didn't have the resources to take on such alarge project. In particular, they didn't have the space and they̶̶ Is that true in the laboratory as well?

didn't have the human resources either.
In our lab we have ongoing research projects at various phases
As for the TBI project, it's given me the opportunity to thinkof development. In some cases we're looking at ideas thatdeeply about our research and what might be possible if weare still in their infancy and quite far from having any practicalwere to actually set about commercializing it, rather then justbusiness applications. Other projects are much further along

publishing a paper and then forgetting about it. At Hongo Iand it would be a shame if we couldn't commercial them.

just pursued my research as far as I could and then published

Since moving to RCAST, our people working on the latter sorta paper, end of story. That's the classic model of pure science.

of project have gotten a lot of practice communicating withAfter writing a good paper, I'd take a little break and thinkpeople outside the lab. On the other hand, those involved

about what I wanted to do next. But looking at things in terms

in more fundamental research don't get to talk directly toof the TBI project, I realized that's not enough. Just publishinginvestors, but they do have people next to them in the laba paper doesn't ensure that my ideas will get passed on to

who are racking their brains trying to ﬁgure out how to makesomeone else. Sure, someone might read that paper andsomething economically feasible, so that naturally rubs off on

think, Wow, I didn't know that was possible, but they won'tthem. Engineers tend to think the grass is always greener, so

necessarily pick up the ball and run with it. There's a big gap

those who are being nagged to keep costs down envy thosebetween writing something down and publishing it, andwho are free to do whatever they want without worrying

seeing it developed on an industrial scale. In academia, weabout money. But the ones with complete freedom to do theirtend to think that when we publish something we can justresearch don't think of themselves as living in an ivory tower

leave the ball on the ground and someone will come along

and leeching off the rest of society.

and pick it up and run with it, but now I realize that's too
simplistic. At the very least, if you don't go out and meet themhalfway, no one's going to come and take the ball from you.

L a b me mb e r s f r om f or e i gn coun t r ie s ar eplaying a central role

TBI is not just about producing quality research but also about
the process of rigorously assessing the economic viability of̶̶ How has it been having researchers and students fromone's ﬁndings. It's ﬁne to do research and publish papers, butforeign countries working on the TBI and Open Laboratory

that's not going far enough in terms of making an impact on

projects?

society.

Researchers detached from societ y andindustr y are just patting themselves on theback

Over half our members are from overseas and the numberof foreign students working in our lab has gradually been
increasing over the years. Since the foreign contingent
makes up the core of the lab, they don't get special treatment
because they're not Japanese and they're playing a central

̶̶ Before it was enough for scientists simply to publish therole. In terms of numbers, the majority is from Asia and theresults of their research, but through TBI you said you wereMiddle East. The breakdown among the Asian countries isable to take a step outside the university. Did you find thatquite varied. We always have some Chinese, Koreans, andtrying to respond to the demands of society and industry

Taiwanese. We also have people from Indonesia, Malaysia, theenabled you to look at things in a more three-dimensional

Philippines, Bangladesh, Thailand, Singapore...

way?
̶̶So English is the common language?
If one is detached from society and industry, then the only
assessment of one's research that matters is one's own. In

Well, you know, when people first arrive they speak only

other words, you're just patting yourself on the back. ButEnglish, but at some point they start speaking Japanese.

society is interested in things, not ideas, and it lets you know

That's because they learn to speak Japanese better than wewhen your ideas are not commercially viable. That's when you

can speak English. In particular, it's astonishing how fast thestart to think, what can I do with this?

foreign research students pick up the language.

̶̶ Compared to when you were just publishing papers, you̶̶In that case, what sort of role do the Japanese play in themeet different kinds of people, don't you? Did you ﬁnd youlab?

could communicate with them?

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Well, they're also a mixed bag. Some of them compete withthe foreign students in showing leadership, others don't.
The thing is, the foreign students have had to go through arigorous ﬁltering process to get where they are, whereas theJapanese students have just passed the entrance exam andthat's it. They've never really had their feet held to the ﬁre. Just
because they were brilliant once, long ago, doesn't necessarilymean that they're still brilliant.

In the af termath of the IT bubble, businessclimate is picking up
̶̶ What changes have you seen in the research community
in the past ﬁve years?
Up until five years ago this field had been the beneficiaryof a phenomenal amount of confidence, but when the IT
bubble burst all the air suddenly got sucked out of the room.
The fallout was particularly noticeable among the industry
and business leaders with whom we deal. For the past fiveyears, those of us at the Open Laboratory and TBI have beentalking about how to get back on track, but now the windseems to have changed direction and the storm is blowing
over. Lately, the business climate looks to be picking up. In
the meantime, society's dependence on telecommunications
has only increased. In the beginning, when the IT bubble
burst, there was a feeling that telecommunications wasn't
important anymore, but it seems that people have steppedback from that view. Actual demand has picked up andinformation technology itself has advanced. Everything seems
to be clicking into place. The Super COE Program has been adriving force over the past five years, and even TBI and theOpen Laboratory have come a long way. With the backingof NEDO, the Open Laboratory will be having its debut at aninternational forum, while the TBI Project has now reached
the stage where it's about ready for to be launched.
̶̶ So these past ﬁve years have been a signiﬁcant ﬁve years
for you personally.
I've experienced culture shock on many different levels
during these first five years since coming to RCAST, but I've
developed many new collaborative relationships with otherresearchers and, as I said earlier, by working on the OpenLaboratory and TBI projects I've learned how to communicate
with people in other fields whom I couldn't communicate
with before. All of this has stimulated my own research to agreat extent. In that sense, these past ﬁve years have been avery good period in my life.
(January 13, 2006)

Links
Nakano Laboratory
http://www.ee.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp/˜nakano/lab/index-e.html

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