Special AMT-BHI 2013 Joint Keynote Speaker:

    Professor Yuichiro Anzai
    President, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Japan
    https://www.jsps.go.jp/english/aboutus/index.html


Human-Robot Interaction: Our Experience Since 1991

Abstract:
AMT (Active Media Technology) and Brain and Health Informatics (BHI) are both growing and enlarging arenas that attract people interested in a variety of fields from sciences to engineering, and to our quality of lives and society. Even there are lots of enchanting topics at the intersection of AMT and BHI, notably including R&D towards smooth and comfortable interaction between humans and their environments. In the main course of this talk, I will compile, as an example from such enchanting topics, our long-standing effort since 1991 towards new ways of exploring human-robot interaction. It contains basic technologies, design implications given from cognitive sciences, and possible application to the improvement of the quality of our lives. In the talk I will spare a little bit of time to touch upon the current and possible future trends of science, technology and innovation policies in Japan, particularly those related to AMT and BHI, that may help develop birds-eye views of our dynamically moving fields.

Speaker Biography:
Yuichiro Anzai, while receiving M.S. in 1971 and Ph.D. in 1974 both from Keio University, started research on human cognitive processes and machine learning in mid 1970’s, and spent 1976-78 and 1981-82 at Carnegie-Mellon University as post-doc and visiting assistant professor, respectively. After coming back to his country, he became associate professor in psychology at Hokkaido University (1985-88), and professor in computer science at Keio University (1988). He was also visiting professor at McGill University (1990). Up to the present he has kept working on human learning and problem solving processes, while doing extensive research on human-robot interaction that he started in 1991 with his students. He published numerous academic articles and books, including Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning, Concepts and Characteristics of Knowledge-based Systems (co-ed) and Symbiosis of Human and Artifact Vols. 1 and 2 (co-ed), all written in English, and Mind and Brain: Introduction to Cognitive Science and The Psychology of Problem Solving: Ideas towards the Age of Human Beings, both in Japanese.

He spent eight years as Dean of Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University (1993-2001), then eight more years as President of the same university (2001-09). In October 2011 he became President, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, the representative governmental research funding agency that supports basic research in all the academic fields, as well as a large number of post-docs and doctoral students, and a variety of international academic collaborations.

Anzai is currently chairing University Subcouncil of the Central Council for Education and Council for the Innovation of Learning, and also working as a member of the Council for Science and Technology and its Brain Science Committee. His past public contribution includes Chairperson of Association of Pacific Rim Universities (2008-09), Member of the Science Council of Japan (2005-11), and President of the Information Processing Society of Japan (2005-07) and Japanese Cognitive Science Society (1993-94).