Core of excellence for research and development of “Water Interface”

Background

“Water” is one of the most essential substances which supports our basis of lives in various forms, and we, not only the human being but also all the life cannot survive without the benefit of water. It plays crucial roles to transfer oxygen, nutrition and waste, and to assist structuring and fulfilling cells, tissues and organs. Additionally, in industrial fields, it is of importance in drinking, cleaning, immersion, coating and so on. So, it is no exaggeration to say that water is the longest and most frequently used substance in our history. However, there are still plenty of unexplained issues in its properties,performance and function; especially, interaction between water and materials’ surface, namely “water interface”, is generally very complicated and particularly difficult to be fully understood (Fig. 1).

To tackle these issues, a former research center, Water Frontier Science and Technology Research Center (W-FST) was launched on November 2016.Through research activities of W-FST, it is found that the topic of “water interface” is crucial and is highly needed both for academics and industries.
Then we concluded to keep our continuous challenges and progresses to these issues by expanding and deepening the fields. Then, the successive research center “Water Frontier Research Center (WaTUS)”has been established after the reorganization on April 2021 to highly promote our research activities.The logotype of our center (Fig. 2) represents “water” encompassing its molecule, nature of continuum, and interfacical behavior.

Fig.1　Various phenomena and applications of “Water Interface” from atomic/molecular scale to macroscale

Fig. 2　Logo of Water Frontier Research Center (WaTUS)

Our mission

We, WaTUS, aims to pursue leading-edge researches and developments relating to“ Water Interface” with multi-disciplinarily collaborative researches. Our mission is to perform following missions (Fig. 3);

( i ) Pursuit of state-of-the-art science and technologies of water interface by
collaboration and technical excellence
( i i ) Establishment of international research core of excellence
( i i i ) Provision of“ one-stop service” of water researches for industries
( i v ) Visualization of TUS through our research activities

Formation of research and development hub for“ Water Interface” through our researches means to create the place where researchers all over the world can join and to establish research organization which can provide practical solutions to industries.

To carry our above-mentioned missions, highly intensive collaborations of fundamental researches and technical developments with researchers inside and outside of the center become a key.

Fig. 3　Strategies of WaTUS

Research organization of WaTUS

WaTUS promotes interdisciplinary collaborative researches to achieve our goals. We consist of matrix-based research units with approaches (Materials development, Measurement & Analysis, and Theory & Simulation) and targets (Materials & Water, Life & Water, and Environment & Water). In this 3 x 3 matrix-based research unit (Fig. 4), our center encourages researchers who develop novel materials with high functionality, ones who develop cuttingedge measurement and analysis techniques, and ones who perform advanced theoretical consideration and simulation, to perform intensively flexible collaborative studies expecting synergetic effects. Also, more flexible style of collaboration involving ones outside of the center are appreciated in this center.

Materials and Water : this unit pursues research and development considering relation between water and materials from atomic to macroscale

Life and Water : this unit pursues research and development contributing to human beings and medical diagnostics or medical and biological engineering

Environment and Water : this unit pursues research and development for environment and industries. Earth science and energy conservation is also included in this unit.

In addition, events such as the Water Frontier Symposium and evening seminars are held to promote the output of research activities and enhance mutual exchange among related researchers.

Fig. 4　Matrix-based research units in WaTUS

Future Development Goals

To promote advanced researches on water interface by collaboration, and to form a research organization offering one-stop service for water science and technology.

Message

Water is one of the most familiar substances but there are many unexplained issues, especially around the interface with materials surface. We, WaTUS, tackle these researches relating to “water interface” by interdisciplinary approaches and aim to provide practical solutions to industries as well.