Kyoto University, Graduate School of Informatics

From Kyoto to the world.

Informatics is a cutting-edge interdisciplinary
field for the 21st century which assimilates information
with humans and society.

Interfacas withHumans & Society●intelligence Science &Technology●Social Infornatics

Analysis
Modeling
Fundamentals in Modeling●Advanced MathematicalSciences●Applied Mathematics &Physics●Data Science

Application

HumanSociety

Systematization
Infrastructures●Systems Science●Communications &Computer
Engineering

CONTENTS■Outlines of Graduate School of Informatics
Deﬁnition of Informatics

03

Welcome to Graduate School of Informatics

04

List of Courses and Groups

07■Introduction of the Courses
Intelligence Science and Technology Course

09

Social Informatics Course

19

Advanced Mathematical Sciences Course

29

Applied Mathematics and Physics Course

35

Systems Science Course

41

Communications and Computer Engineering Course

49

Data Science Course

57■ Related Educational Programs

65

Kyoto University School of Platforms (KUSP)
Kyoto University Collaborative Graduate Program in Design
International Program at Graduate School of Informatics■ Academic Programs

68

Curriculum Policy
Academic Programs
University Fellowship in Informatics
Career path after graduation■ List of Departments, Divisions and Groups

71

List of Departments, Divisions and Groups
Advances Information-Related Education &Digital Education Infrastructure Unit(Center for the Promotion of Interdisciplinary Education and Research(c-PiER))

The Kyoto University ICT Collaboration Promotion Network■Graduate School of Informatics Fund74

D eﬁ nit io n o f Info r m at ic s

Informatics in Kyoto University is the study of information innatural and artiﬁcial systems.

Informatics studies the creation, recognition, representation,collection, organization,optimization, transformation, communication, evaluation andcontrol of information incomplex and dynamic systems.

Informatics has human, social, cognitive,
biological, linguistic, computational,mathematical and engineering aspects.
It includes systems science andcommunications engineering.

Informatics has close relations with a numberof disciplines in the natural and human sciences.
It is developed employing contributions from many diﬀerent
areas : in turn, it can contribute to their further development.

Interfaces to human and social areas, mathematical modelingand information systems are the three pillars of Informatics
in Kyoto University.

03

Welcome to Graduate School of Informatics
Kyoto University Graduate School of Informatics, which was thefirst graduate school in Japan to use the term “informatics” in itsname when it was established in April 1998, recently celebrated
the 25th anniversary of its founding. Here, I would like to offer anoverview of the research fields and educational programs ofGraduate School of Informatics and outline some of its
outstanding features.
Dean, Graduate School of Informatics

Atsushi Igarashi

What is Informatics?
The preceding section of this booklet includes a definition ofinformatics as envisioned by this graduate school. It states that
“informatics in Kyoto University is the study of information innatural and artificial systems,” that “informatics has human,social, cognitive, biological, linguistic, computational,mathematical, and engineering aspects … and includes systems
science and communications engineering,” and that it “has close
relations with a number of disciplines in the natural and humansciences.” The term “information” tends to highlightcomputer-based technologies, such as information andcommunication technologies (ICT) and artificial intelligence(AI), but our definition of informatics points to an academic
discipline that is far more interdisciplinary than thesetechnologies suggest.
As mentioned, our graduate school was the first in Japan todefine itself using the term “informatics.” Up to that time, mostschools and departments in Japan in this general field used names
containing “computer science/engineering” or “informationscience,” but between the late 1990s and early 2000s, Kyoto

schools in information-related science, typically with names like
“Graduate School of Information Science/Engineering” or“Graduate School of Information Science.” Only Kyoto
University adopted the broader term “informatics.” In fact, twoyears before Graduate School of Informatics was established, the“School of Informatics and Mathematical Science” was created inthe Faculty of Engineering through a merger of the School ofInformation Science and the School of Applied Mathematics andPhysics. The use of “informatics” was very unusual at the time.
These name choices were motivated by the desire of the people
involved in setting up this graduate school to establish a broader
discipline of “informatics” to transcend the limits of theconventional disciplines of “information science/engineering” or“information science.”
I imagine that all the students who apply to this graduate
school are keen to study their chosen field of specialization
seriously. As they steadfastly pursue their desire, I hope that theyalso take the time to look around to survey the whole of thegraduate school and experience the full breadth of “informatics.”
As explained below, the educational program is designed to allow
students to experience a wide range of this rich and broad field.

University and some other leading universities, including
Hokkaido University, Tohoku University, The University ofTokyo, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Nagoya University,
Osaka University, and Kyushu University established graduate

Graduate School of Informatics

04

Education and Research in Graduate Schoolof Informatics
Graduate School of Informatics is one of the largest graduate

students naturally cultivate a deeper knowledge of their field ofspecialization through the research guidance of their academicadvisors, but they also acquire a comprehensive academic vision
through seminar subjects in each course.

schools at Kyoto University, with a current intake (per academicyear) of 240 students for the Master’s program and 60 students

As part of its efforts to internationalize education, the schoolfor the Doctoral program. The graduate school consists of sevenoffers a number of courses in English. These are taught by both“courses” of study under the “major” of informatics.

Japanese and non-Japanese faculty. In some courses, we evenenable students to earn a Master’s degree without learningIntelligence Science and Technology Course

Japanese, by offering classes and research guidance in English

Social Informatics Course( “International Program” ). In the case of Doctoral programs,

Advanced Mathematical Sciences Course

students can pursue their research and earn a PhD in any of theApplied Mathematics and Physics Course

courses without the need to learn Japanese. Even Japanese

Systems Science Course

students (who are not international students) can choose to takeCommunications and Computer Engineering Course

the International Program if it is offered for the course they are

Data Science Course

pursuing. On successful completion, such students are awarded
an “International Program Completion Certificate” along with

Each course is taught not only by faculty from within thetheir degree.

Graduate School of Informatics, but also by faculty (ascooperating professors) from other departments within theGraduate School of Informatics also takes part in five-year

university, such as the Academic Center for Computing anddoctoral programs offered by multiple Kyoto University graduate

Media Studies, Disaster Prevention Research Institute, Kyoto

schools in collaboration with companies, overseas universities,

University Hospital, Institute for Chemical Research, Researchresearch institutes, and other external organizations. These are

Institute for Sustainable Humanosphere, and Institute forthe Kyoto University School of Platforms and Kyoto University

Liberal Arts and Sciences, as well as by collaborating researchers

Collaborative Graduate Program in Design, run by the Centerfrom institutions outside the university, including RIKEN,

for the Promotion of Excellence in Higher Education (CPEHE).

NTT, Hitachi, Advanced Telecommunications ResearchStudents in Graduate School of Informatics can take advantage

Institute International (ATR), and Okinawa Institute of Scienceof these programs to earn a degree. For additional information,and Technology (OIST). The research fields (labs) of each course

see a more detailed outline or access applicable website URLs ofare described in the introduction to each course below. The

these programs below (in this booklet).

names of these courses alone indicate the remarkable breadth of
study and research covered by Graduate School of Informatics.

It is not an overstatement to say that graduates of this school

Leading-edge informatics research is conducted in all these fields.

who have received this kind of advanced education are becoming
increasingly sought after for a variety of roles as the field of

A key feature of the curricula of our graduate school is that it isinformatics expands. Such graduates typically find work as

designed not only to allow students to study the primaryresearchers in universities or corporate research labs, and as

academic major of their choice, but also to equip them with aexpert engineers in a wide range of industries, including ICT,

broad range of knowledge that transcends the boundaries of their

manufacturing, finance, broadcasting, and services.

c h o s e n fi e l d o f s p e c i a l i z a t i o n . O n e e x a m p l e i s t h einter-departmental course “Perspectives in Informatics,” required
electives for the Master’s program. In the Doctoral program,05

Welcome to Graduate School of Informatics

Our Reorganization

places great importance on pure research. Without a deep
knowledge of the fundamentals, it is not possible to create robust

In April 2023, on the 25th anniversary of its establishment,

technologies that can remain useful for many years. Informatics as

Kyoto University Graduate School of Informatics wasa field of study is still in its nascent phase. Given the youthfulness

reorganized. The six existing departments (Intelligence Scienceof this field, it seems very fitting to pursue research in informaticsand Technology, Social Informatics, Advanced Mathematicalat Kyoto University, in a city where tradition and innovation have

Sciences, Applied Mathematics and Physics, Systems Science, andcoexisted for many centuries. We look forward to seeing students

Communications and Computer Engineering) were merged into

take up exciting challenges under this new structure.

a single Department of Informatics. The educational programs ofthe previous six departments were transformed into “courses” anda new “Data Science Course” was added (making a total of sevencourses). At the same time, the total student intake for theMaster’s program was increased (from 189 to 240 students per
academic year).
The main purposes of the reorganization were to respond to
the sharp rise in the number of students wishing to study
informatics in recent years, as well as to cultivate experts in theincreasingly important field of data science, which is closely
connected to informatics. Creating multiple educational courses
under a single major (field of specialization) also allows the school
to establish and deliver more flexible educational programs. Infact, education in the new Data Science Course will be provided
both by faculty who work primarily in Graduate School ofInformatics and faculty from the Center for Innovative Researchand Education in Data Science of the Kyoto University Institutefor Liberal Arts and Sciences, who will concurrently serve inGraduate School of Informatics. Structuring the educational
program in this way would have been difficult under aAtsushi Igarashi

Dean, Graduate School of Informatics

conventional framework of majors. We regard this reduction to asingle major as an important initiative for enabling us to provide
education that is better attuned to the anticipated changes anddevelopments in informatics over the coming years.

Concluding Remarks
This brief overview of Graduate School of Informatics isfocused on educational programs. Of course, a wide variety of
research in informatics is also conducted within the school. The
presentations of the labs in each of the courses offer a glimpse of
these research activities. Graduate School of Informatics also

Atsushi Igarashi is a Professor at Graduate School ofInformatics, Kyoto University. He received his B.S.,
M.S., and D.S. degrees from Department ofInformation Science, University of Tokyo in 1995,
1997, and 2000, respectively. Formerly, he belonged
to Dept. of Graphics and Computer Science, Graduate
School of Arts and Sciences, University of Tokyo. His
major research interests are in theoretical computerscience, in particular, principles of programming
languages and program verification. He has been
awarded a few domestic and international academic
prizes, including the AITO Dahl-Nygaard Junior Prizefor his investigations into the foundation ofobject-oriented programming languages and theirtype systems.

Graduate School of Informatics

06

Courses in Graduate School of Informatics

Distributed Information Systems
Human-Robot Interaction
Social Media
Sociotechnical Design (Adjunct Unit)

Socia

Consensus Informatics

cs Co

irmatl Info

Information Security (Adjunct Unit)

Neuroinformatics

ursePsycho informatics

Intel

Cognitive Informatics

ce Sc

ligen

Computational Cognitive Neuroscience(Adjunct Unit)
Computational Intelligence

ience

Collective Intelligence

Integrated Disaster Management Systems
Emergency Management for DisasterReduction Systems
Crisis Information Management System
Medical Informatics
Learning and Educational Technologies
Data Engineering and Platform Research

Language Media Processing
Speech and Audio Processing
Computer Vision
Human Sensing
Text Media

Applied Analysis

Nonlinear Physics

cal

Biological Information Networks

07

Environmental Informatics

tiema
Math urse
oncedAdva iences CSc

rsey Couolog
echnand T

Conversational Informatics

Bioresource Informatics

Computational Mechanics

Industrial Mathematics

Computer Algorithms
Computer Architecture

CommunComputer Software

icatioDigital Communications

ns an

Integrated-Media Communicationsd CoIntelligent Communication Networks
Processor Architecture andSystems Synthesis

mpu

Applied Mathematical Analysis

ter E

cs anmatiathe urse
oied M
Appl hysics CP

Discrete Mathematics

Integrated Circuits Design Engineering

ngineerin

System Optimizationg Co

Control Systems Theory

urse

Physical Statistics

Advanced Signal Processing
Remote Sensing Engineering
Atmospheric Observations

dSupercomputing

Dynamical Systems
Applied Mathematical Modeling(Adjunct Unit)

Multimedia and Secure Networking

Statistical Mathematics

Mechanical Systems Control

Learning Machines
Integrated Systems Biology

urse

Statistical Intelligencece Coursee Co

cienc

ms S

Mathematical Information Systems

Scien

Syste

Integrated Dynamical Systems

Statistical Inference

Data

Human Systems

Information-Theoretic Learning
Signal and Information Processing
Applied Machine Learning
Medical and Healthcare Data ScienceComputational Intelligence Systems(Adjunct Unit)

Biomedical Engineering
Computational Neuroscience(Adjunct Unit)

Graduate School of Informatics

08