Tag Archives: Tokyo

nano tech 2017 being held in Tokyo from February 15-17, 2017

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I found some news about the Alberta technology scene in the programme for Japan’s nano tech 2017 exhibition and conference to be held Feb. 15 – 17, 2017 in Tokyo. First, here’s more about the show in Japan from a Jan. 17, 2017 nano tech 2017 press release on Business Wire (also on Yahoo News),

The nano tech executive committee (chairman: Tomoji Kawai, Specially Appointed Professor, Osaka University) will be holding “nano tech 2017” – one of the world’s largest nanotechnology exhibitions, now in its 16th year – on February 15, 2017, at the Tokyo Big Sight convention center in Japan. 600 organizations (including over 40 first-time exhibitors) from 23 countries and regions are set to exhibit at the event in 1,000 booths, demonstrating revolutionary and cutting edge core technologies spanning such industries as automotive, aerospace, environment/energy, next-generation sensors, cutting-edge medicine, and more. Including attendees at the concurrently held exhibitions, the total number of visitors to the event is expected to exceed 50,000.

The theme of this year’s nano tech exhibition is “Open Nano Collaboration.” By bringing together organizations working in a wide variety of fields, the business matching event aims to promote joint development through cross-field collaboration.

Special Symposium: “Nanotechnology Contributing to the Super Smart Society”

Each year nano tech holds Special Symposium, in which industry specialists from top organizations from Japan and abroad speak about the issues surrounding the latest trends in nanotech. The themes of this year’s Symposium are Life Nanotechnology, Graphene, AI/IoT, Cellulose Nanofibers, and Materials Informatics.

Notable sessions include:

Life Nanotechnology
“Development of microRNA liquid biopsy for early detection of cancer”
Takahiro Ochiya, National Cancer Center Research Institute Division of Molecular and Cellular Medicine, Chief

AI / IoT
“AI Embedded in the Real World”
Hideki Asoh, AIST Deputy Director, Artificial Intelligence Research Center

Cellulose Nanofibers [emphasis mine]
“The Current Trends and Challenges for Industrialization of Nanocellulose”
Satoshi Hirata, Nanocellulose Forum Secretary-General

Materials Informatics
“Perspective of Materials Research”
Hideo Hosono, Tokyo Institute of Technology Professor

View the full list of sessions:
>> http://nanotech2017.icsbizmatch.jp/Presentation/en/Info/List#main_theater

nano tech 2017 Homepage:
>> http://nanotechexpo.jp/

nano tech 2017, the 16th International Nanotechnology Exhibition & Conference
Date: February 15-17, 2017, 10:00-17:00
Venue: Tokyo Big Sight (East Halls 4-6 & Conference Tower)
Organizer: nano tech Executive Committee, JTB Communication Design

As you may have guessed the Alberta information can be found in the .Cellulose Nanofibers session. From the conference/seminar program page; scroll down about 25% of the way to find the Alberta presentation,

Production and Applications Development of Cellulose Nanocrystals (CNC) at InnoTech Alberta

Behzad (Benji) Ahvazi
InnoTech Alberta Team Lead, Cellulose Nanocrystals (CNC)

[ Abstract ]

The production and use of cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) is an emerging technology that has gained considerable interest from a range of industries that are working towards increased use of “green” biobased materials. The construction of one-of-a-kind CNC pilot plant [emphasis mine] at InnoTech Alberta and production of CNC samples represents a critical step for introducing the cellulosic based biomaterials to industrial markets and provides a platform for the development of novel high value and high volume applications. Major key components including feedstock, acid hydrolysis formulation, purification, and drying processes were optimized significantly to reduce the operation cost. Fully characterized CNC samples were provided to a large number of academic and research laboratories including various industries domestically and internationally for applications development.

[ Profile ]

Dr. Ahvazi completed his Bachelor of Science in Honours program at the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and graduated with distinction at Concordia University in Montréal, Québec. His Ph.D. program was completed in 1998 at McGill Pulp and Paper Research Centre in the area of macromolecules with solid background in Lignocellulosic, organic wood chemistry as well as pulping and paper technology. After completing his post-doctoral fellowship, he joined FPInnovations formally [formerly?] known as PAPRICAN as a research scientist (R&D) focusing on a number of confidential chemical pulping and bleaching projects. In 2006, he worked at Tembec as a senior research scientist and as a Leader in Alcohol and Lignin (R&D). In April 2009, he held a position as a Research Officer in both National Bioproducts (NBP1 & NBP2) and Industrial Biomaterials Flagship programs at National Research Council Canada (NRC). During his tenure, he had directed and performed innovative R&D activities within both programs on extraction, modification, and characterization of biomass as well as polymer synthesis and formulation for industrial applications. Currently, he is working at InnoTech Alberta as Team Lead for Biomass Conversion and Processing Technologies.

Canada scene update

InnoTech Alberta was until Nov. 1, 2016 known as Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures. Here’s more about InnoTech Alberta from the Alberta Innovates … home page,

Effective November 1, 2016, Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures is one of four corporations now consolidated into Alberta Innovates and a wholly owned subsidiary called InnoTech Alberta.

You will find all the existing programs, services and information offered by InnoTech Alberta on this website. To access the basic research funding and commercialization programs previously offered by Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures, explore here. For more information on Alberta Innovates, visit the new Alberta Innovates website.

As for InnoTech Alberta’s “one-of-a-kind CNC pilot plant,” I’d like to know more about it’s one-of-a-kind status since there are two other CNC production plants in Canada. (Is the status a consequence of regional chauvinism or a writer unfamiliar with the topic?). Getting back to the topic, the largest company (and I believe the first) with a CNC plant was CelluForce, which started as a joint venture between Domtar and FPInnovations and powered with some very heavy investment from the government of Canada. (See my July 16, 2010 posting about the construction of the plant in Quebec and my June 6, 2011 posting about the newly named CelluForce.) Interestingly, CelluForce will have a booth at nano tech 2017 (according to its Jan. 27, 2017 news release) although the company doesn’t seem to have any presentations on the schedule. The other Canadian company is Blue Goose Biorefineries in Saskatchewan. Here’s more about Blue Goose from the company website’s home page,

Blue Goose Biorefineries Inc. (Blue Goose) is pleased to introduce our R3TM process. R3TM technology incorporates green chemistry to fractionate renewable plant biomass into high value products.

Traditionally, separating lignocellulosic biomass required high temperatures, harsh chemicals, and complicated processes. R3TM breaks this costly compromise to yield high quality cellulose, lignin and hemicellulose products.

The robust and environmentally friendly R3TM technology has numerous applications. Our current product focus is cellulose nanocrystals (CNC). Cellulose nanocrystals are “Mother Nature’s Building Blocks” possessing unique properties. These unique properties encourage the design of innovative products from a safe, inherently renewable, sustainable, and carbon neutral resource.

Blue Goose assists companies and research groups in the development of applications for CNC, by offering CNC for sale without Intellectual Property restrictions. [emphasis mine]

Bravo to Blue Goose! Unfortunately, I was not able to determine if the company will be at nano tech 2017.

One final comment, there was some excitement about CNC a while back where I had more than one person contact me asking for information about how to buy CNC. I wasn’t able to be helpful because there was, apparently, an attempt by producers to control sales and limit CNC access to a select few for competitive advantage. Coincidentally or not, CelluForce developed a stockpile which has persisted for some years as I noted in my Aug. 17, 2016 posting (scroll down about 70% of the way) where the company announced amongst other events that it expected deplete its stockpile by mid-2017.

Man with world’s first implanted bionic arm participates in first Cybathlon (olympics for cyborgs)

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The world’s first Cybathlon is being held on Oct. 8, 2016 in Zurich, Switzerland. One of the participants is an individual who took part in some groundbreaking research into implants which was featured in my Oct. 10, 2014 posting. There’s more about the Cybathlon and the participant in an Oct. 4, 2016 news item on phys.org,

A few years ago, a patient was implanted with a bionic arm for the first time in the world using control technology developed at Chalmers University of Technology. He is now taking part in Cybathlon, a new international competition in which 74 participants with physical disabilities will compete against each other, using the latest robotic prostheses and other assistive technologies – a sort of ‘Cyborg Olympics’.

The Paralympics will now be followed by the Cybathlon, which takes place in Zürich on October 8th [2016]. This is the first major competition to show that the boundaries between human and machine are becoming more and more blurred. The participants will compete in six different disciplines using the machines they are connected to as well as possible.

Cybathlon is intended to drive forward the development of prostheses and other types of assistive aids. Today, such technologies are often highly advanced technically, but provide limited value in everyday life.

An Oct. 4, 2016 Chalmers University of Technology press release by Johanna Wilde, which originated the news item, provides details about the competitor, his prosthetic device, and more,

Magnus, one of the participants, has now had his biomechatronically integrated arm prosthesis for almost four years. He says that his life has totally changed since the implantation, which was performed by Dr Rickard Brånemark, associate professor at Sahlgrenska University Hospital.

“I don’t feel handicapped since I got this arm”, says Magnus. “I can now work full time and can perform all the tasks in both my job and my family life. The prosthesis doesn’t feel like a machine, but more like my own arm.”

Magnus lives in northern Sweden and works as a lorry driver. He regularly visits Gothenburg in southern Sweden and carries out tests with researcher Max Ortiz Catalan, assistant professor at Chalmers University of Technology, who has been in charge of developing the technology and leads the team competing in the Cybathlon.

“This is a completely new research field in which we have managed to directly connect the artificial limb to the skeleton, nerves and muscles,” says Dr Max Ortiz Catalan. “In addition, we are including direct neural sensory feedback in the prosthetic arm so the patient can intuitively feel with it.”

Today Magnus can feel varying levels of pressure in his artificial hand, something which is necessary to instinctively grip an object firmly enough. He is unique in the world in having a permanent sensory connection between the prosthesis and his nervous system, working outside laboratory conditions. Work is now under way to add more types of sensations.

At the Cybathlon he will be competing for the Swedish team, which is formed by Chalmers University of Technology, Sahlgrenska University Hospital and the company Integrum AB.

The competition has a separate discipline for arm prostheses. In this discipline Magnus has to complete a course made up of six different stations at which the prosthesis will be put to the test. For example, he has to open a can with a can opener, load a tray with crockery and open a door with the tray in his hand. The events at the Cybathlon are designed to be spectator-friendly while being based on various operations that the participants have to cope with in their daily lives.

“However, the competition will not really show the unique advantages of our technology, such as the sense of touch and the bone-anchored attachment which makes the prosthesis comfortable enough to wear all day,” says Max Ortiz Catalan.

Magnus is the only participant with an amputation above the elbow. This naturally makes the competition more difficult for him than for the others, who have a natural elbow joint.

“From a competitive perspective Cybathlon is far from ideal to demonstrate clinically viable technology,” says Max Ortiz Catalan. “But it is a major and important event in the human-machine interface field in which we would like to showcase our technology. Unlike several of the other participants, Magnus will compete in the event using the same technology he uses in his everyday life.”

Facts about Cybathlon
•    The very first Cybathlon is being organised by the Swiss university ETH Zürich.
•    The €5 million event will take place in Zürich´s 7600 spectator ice hockey stadium, Swiss Arena.
•    74 participants are competing for 59 different teams from 25 countries around the world. In total, the teams consist of about 300 scientists, engineers, support staff and competitors.
•    The teams range from small ad hoc teams to the world’s largest manufacturers of advanced prostheses.
•    The majority of the teams are groups from research labs and many of the prostheses have come straight out of the lab.
•    Unlike the Olympics and Paralympics, the Cybathlon participants are not athletes but ordinary people with various disabilities. The aims of the competition are to establish a dialogue between academia and industry, to facilitate discussion between technology developers and people with disabilities and to promote the use of robotic assistive aids to the general public.
•    Cybathlon will return in 2020, as a seven-day event in Tokyo, to coincide with the Olympics.

Facts about the Swedish team
The Opra Osseointegration team is a multidisciplinary team comprising technical and medical partners. The team is led by Dr Max Ortiz Catalan, assistant professor at Chalmers University of Technology, who has been in charge of developing the technology in close collaboration with Dr Rickard Brånemark, who is a surgeon at Sahlgrenska University Hospital and an associate professor at Gothenburg University. Dr Brånemark led the team performing the implantation of the device. Integrum AB, a Swedish company, complements the team as the pioneering provider of bone-anchored limb prostheses.

This video gives you an idea of what it’s in store on Oct. 8, 2016,

nano tech 2013 in Tokyo

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I usually mention International Nanotechnology Exhibition and Conference held in Tokyo as it is one of the larger nanotechnology shows in the world. Last year, over they recorded over 45,000 visits, 649 exhibitors, and 802 booths during the three day show which was held Feb. 14 – 17, 2012 according to the report on 2012 show.

This year’s nano tech 2013 will run from Jan. 30 – Feb. 2, 2013 and thanks to the folks at NanoInk for reminding me of the show in their Jan. 10,2013 news release,

NanoInk, Inc.® is pleased to announce that its NanoFabrication Systems and NanoProfessor® Divisions will be exhibiting and making presentations at the 12th International Nanotechnology Exhibition and Conference, from Wednesday, January 30 through Friday, February 1 in Tokyo, Japan. The conference will be held at the East Exhibition Hall 4, 5, 6 & Conference Tower at Tokyo Big Sight. NanoInk’s NanoFabrication Systems and NanoProfessor Divisions will be at booth number 5F-15. Technical staff will be available to provide demonstrations of the NLP 2000 System, and answer questions about NanoInk’s Dip Pen Nanolithography® (DPN®) technology, applications, and products for both research and education.

On Friday, February 1, at 11:30, Dean Hart, chief commercial officer for NanoInk, will be making a presentation in the Main Theater (East Hall 5) titled, “Meeting the Nanotech Workforce Needs Through Hands-On Education.” Following that, Saju Nettikadan, applications director for NanoInk, will be making a presentation at 13:00 in the same location titled, “New Advances in Applications Using Dip-Pen Nanolithography.”

…

The NLP 2000 is also the cornerstone of NanoInk’s NanoProfessor Division, which is the global leader in handson undergraduate nanotechnology education. In just over 24 months, the NanoProfessor Nanoscience Education Program has been chosen to serve as the foundation for hands-on undergraduate nanotechnology education by over 20 institutions in five countries. It alternates between classroom lectures and engaging, handson nanoscale lab work. The NanoProfessor curriculum includes a textbook authored by leading nanotechnology experts, covering the topics of Nanotechnology Instrumentation, Imaging and Nanofabrication Techniques, Nanophysics, Nanochemistry, Nanobiology, and Perspectives on Environmental, Health, and Safety within Nanotechnology. In conducting the hands-on lab experiments, students work with state-of-the-art, nano-centric instrumentation including NanoInk’s NLP 2000 Desktop NanoFabrication System.

You can read the full news release here.  I did previously note that NanoInk’s NanoProfessor Nanoscience Education Program had come to the University of Calgary (Alberta, Canada)  in an April 12, 2011 posting.

Internet of Things 2012 conference: call for papers

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The 3rd International Conference on the Internet of Things will be held Oct. 24 – 26, 2012 in Wuxi, China. From the Call for papers page,

In what is called the Internet of Things (IoT), sensors and actuators embedded in physical objects — from containers to pacemakers — are linked through both wired and wireless networks to the Internet. When objects in the IoT can sense the environment, interpret the data, and communicate with each other, they become tools for understanding complexity and for responding to events and irregularities swiftly. The IoT is therefore seen by many as the ultimate solution for getting fine grained insights into business processes — in the real-world and in real-time. Started one decade ago as a wild academic idea, this interlinking of the physical world and cyberspace foreshadows an exciting endeavour that is highly relevant to researchers, corporations, and individuals.

…

The IoT2012 conference will focus on these core research challenges.

IoT 2012

The IoT conference series has become the major biennial event that brings internationally leading researchers and practitioners from both academia and industry together to facilitate the sharing of applications, research results, and knowledge. Building on the success of the last two conferences (2008 in Zurich and 2010 in Tokyo), the 3rd International Conference on the Internet of Things (IoT2012) will include a highly selective dual-track program for technical papers, accompanied by reports on business projects from seasoned practitioners, poster sessions summarizing late-breaking results, and hands-on demos of current technology.  We invite submissions of original and unpublished work covering areas related to the IoT, in one or more of the following three categories: technical papers, posters, and demonstrations.

IoT Topics of Interest

IoT 2012 welcomes submissions on the following topics:

* IoT architectures and system design
* IoT networking and communication
* Circuit and system design for smart objects in the IoT
* Novel IoT services and applications for society/corporations/individuals
* Emerging IoT business models and corresponding process changes
* Cooperative data processing for IoT
* Social impacts such as security, privacy, and trust in the IoT

Work addressing real-world implementation and deployment issues is encouraged.

The deadlines (according to the newsletter I received) are:

papers : May 1 2012 | posters, demos: August 1 2012

Given last week’s flutter of interest (See Brian Braiker’s April 5, 2012 posting for the Guardian, etc.)  in the Google goggles or as they prefer to call it, the Google Project Glass, this conference would offer information about the practical aspects of  implementation for at least one of these scenarios,

Assuming you’ve watched the video, imagine the number of embedded sensors and tracking information needed to give the user up-to-date instructions on his walking route to the bookstore. On that note, I’m glad to see there’s one IoT 2012 conference theme devoted to social impacts such as security and privacy.