NICT NEWS asked Dr. Hideo Miyahara, our · which Wikipedia does, which is a new form of culture…...

1 NICT NEWS, OCT, 2008

NICT NEWS asked Dr. Hideo Miyahara, ourPresident and Mr. Kazuma Yamane, a

nonfiction writer to talk about the presentstatus of information and

telecommunications and NICT’s outlook onfuture developments in the field.

Kazuma Yamane: Born in 1947.Graduated from the Faculty of ForeignLanguages, Dokkyo University. A nonfictionwriter, Mr. Yamane anchored a NHK TVprogram “Midnight Journal” (1990-1992)and “Mirai-ha Sengen (Declarations of aFuturist)”. His serial articles “Metaru kara nojidai (An Era of Metal Color)” for a weeklymagazine won the Japan Creation Award2008. General Producer for Aichi PrefecturePavilion at EXPO 2005 Japan. He is theauthor of many books, including Dejitarusangyo kakumei (The Digital IndustrialRevolution), Supa shosai no yugi-jutsu (PlaySkills for Super-Studies), Metaru kara nojidai (An Era of Metal Color).

Hideo Miyahara: Born in 1943. Graduatedfrom the Division of Electrical, Electronicand Information Engineering, Faculty ofEngineering, Osaka University. Studied inthe Doctoral Program of the GraduateSchool of Information Science andTechnology, Osaka University. AssistantProfessor at the Faculty of BasicEngineering, Osaka University (1980).Director of the Large Computer Center(1995). Dean of the Graduate School ofBasic Engineering, Osaka University (1998).Director of the International Student Center,Osaka University (2000), Dean of theGraduate School of Information Scienceand Technology, Osaka University (2002).President of Osaka University (2003-2007).Current post since September, 2007.

Hideo Miyahara(President of NICT)

Kazuma Yamane(Nonfiction Writer)

Looking at theFuture of

Information andTelecommunication

Yamane: Since about 15 years ago, we have becomemore deeply dependent on mobile phones and e-mail tothe extent that we are now forced to use them despitetheir many problems. It seems to me that these systemslack something which is the most essential for humanbeings. This has happened, don’t you think, becausenobody took the care to develop technologies whichwould enable real human-to-human heartfeltcommunication that truly connected people?Miyahara: I agree. Allow me to cite here the words ofmy teacher, Prof. Nobuaki Kumagaya, a formerPresident of Osaka University, in the order of threePresidents back from my period as President at thatuniversity. Prof. Kumagaya said that Information andTelecommunications (Jo-ho-tsu-shin in Japanese) is atechnology which “reliably (shin) communicates (tsu)with others to reward (ho) their hearts (jo).” I totallyagree with this.Yamane: I also started my book Jo-ho no shigoto jutsu(Information Working Skills) with the sentence,“Information (jo-ho in Japanese) means to reward (ho)hearts (jo),” and thus “Information should connect thehearts of people.” Miyahara: As we speak, our communications are heart-to-heart communications, or brain-to-braincommunications. Communication is a concept on a

higher level than a simple exchange of data orcharacters.Yamane: But the word “jo-ho,” information in English,has somehow acquired a rather cold image, don’t youthink?Miyahara: I think that emotion is important, and thatthe current term ‘e-mail’ should be called E(motional) e-mail, with an extra ‘E’, or Ee-mail. We will need todevelop technologies which can handle feelings oremotions. People now tend to think that sending an e-mail through the Internet is enough, or taking classesand getting credits can be achieved while sitting in frontof a TV screen. They think of communication as beingsomething with a narrowly-defined meaning. That’s whymany of the problems arise.Yamane: On the way here today, I looked at a bulletinboard in a small park nearby and realized that an actualbulletin board with paper notices on it was really good.The information posted on Internet BBSs will not’fade’, but the notices put up on a bulletin board in apark will become tattered and the colors will fade asthey age. We can see quite clearly that the information isold. Also, the workmanship on the posters on thebulletin board gives us some idea of the situation of anorganization or its activities, doesn’t it? Theinformation, therefore, has very emotional aspects, suchas the chronological changes in the information and thescript styles. Aspects that information on the Internetlacks.

Information and telecommunications is atechnology which “reliably communicateswith others to reward their hearts”

NICT NEWS, OCT, 2008 2

Miyahara: Yes, it’s not a good idea to try to replace allinformation (jo-ho) with ICT (Information andCommunication Technology) media. That wouldn’twork. The fact that textbooks are created in the form ofbooks has a special meaning. For example, we can’t turnover the pages on ICT media to search for specificinformation. That function doesn’t exist. That’s whypaper media will never disappear. Paper media haveways of containing information and enabling searchesfor information which are specific to the media.Naturally, it would be very dangerous if we had onlyone way, the Internet, to acquire information,Yamane: I have a specific worry about Wikipedia. Ofcourse, it’s of great significance for the people of theworld to share and accumulate ‘knowledge’ in the waywhich Wikipedia does, which is a new form of culture… Miyahara: Yes, it’s a problem when we do not knowwho wrote a specific article. The point here is how touse it. Reading Wikipedia is fine, but we should notassume that all of the information on Wikipedia iscorrect.

Yamane: I think the identity of information, when itwas written, who wrote it, and so on, should always beclearly indicated when the information is shared amonga large number of people. Every publication bases itsreliability on clear declarations of authorship andpublisher and the dissemination of information in aresponsible manner. On the Internet, however,anonymity has been implicitly accepted since theearliest stages. What was the reason for that?Miyahara: From the beginning, the Internet wasdeveloped to connect computers and exchange data. Thesimultaneous use of multiple computers was found to bebetter and more effective for scientific and engineeringcalculations than the use of stand-alone computers.That’s why the Internet was developed. After a while,researchers started using e-mail for communication andfound it very useful. Since then, the Internet hasexpanded explosively to its current size. The convenientnature of the Internet has been strongly emphasized, andnow everybody is using it. The fact is that, in somesenses, the issue of rules and regulations for the use ofthe Internet has been overlooked.

Yamane: “We can make the rules later.” When I startedto use computer online services in the mid-80s, anyoneposting a strange message on a BBS could be easilyidentified, because everyone’s ID was clearly shown bythe system. It was not anonymous, and the BBS washealthy in that way. On the Internet, on the other hand,anonymity has been taken for granted and it could easilyhave become a safe-haven for criminals. Miyahara: Technology has made even anonymitypossible on the Internet. People are clearly abusing thisfunction. They can say in an e-mail things that theywould not otherwise dare to say in front of others. Manycases of spiteful abuse are sent as mobile phone e-mail.Yamane: Yes, this is the dark side of networktechnologies which nobody expected. Miyahara: One of the missions of engineers likeourselves is to provide a variety of services, but the rulesfor using these services, and the abilities required tomake full use of them, are not being properly acquired.People usually look at only 0.001% of the total searchresults obtained from search engines. When hundreds ofresults are obtained from a search, people naturally donot look at the very lowest items.Yamane: The rank order of results shown by searchengines isn’t really very fair, is it?Miyahara: You’re right. It’s not fair at all. Displayranking is determined by the number of times withwhich a certain piece of information has been accessed,and by the number of links to that information.Therefore, the first results may reflect only a minorityopinion.Yamane: The situation might be improved if we couldchoose the display order for search results, for example,a descending or ascending order by the number of timeswith which some information has been accessed, or indescending order from the oldest information, and so on. Miyahara: It may be possible to add such functions tosearch engines, but it is doubtful that such services makeany sense for search engine companies. That’s why it isbetter not to be dependent on only one search engineonly. Furthermore, the most important thing for us ishow to retrieve really reliable information. For example,there is a great deal of information on cancer all aroundus, but is it correct? We have to determine how reliablethe information is by checking it against the opinions ofappropriate medical institutions, or the author of theinformation concerned. NICT is studying ways ofproviding such information, but it is difficult to teachcomputers how to check contents and determine theirreliability. So we are planning to check and makejudgments on whether the information is coming fromreliable organizations or simply from any individual’sopinion. Yamane: When I want to find out something, I usuallystart by checking at reference sites such asJapanKnowledge, which mostly contains encyclopedias.These are charged services, but they are not soexpensive. Anyway, I feel safe with these sites becausethey make it clear who the articles are written by. Miyahara: As a general rule, reliable information is

A bulletin board in a park gives information a moreemotional, ‘heart-rewarding’ feel.

As a general rule, reliable information isworth paying for.We should try to perceive the value of thingswhich cannot be seen.


worth paying for. We should recognizethe value of information in anappropriate manner. Particularly, Japanese people should bemore positive about perceiving thevalue of things which cannot be seen. Everybody in Japan should, I think,recognize that some costs are inevitablefor safety and security.Yamane: Yes, but the Internetestablished the idea that information isfree. Many people now say that theywill never pay for information on theInternet. Miyahara: One thing is the cost ofcommunication lines, that is, the costsof broadband service. That cost was the highest in theworld in Japan 10 years ago. It was about ten timesmore expensive than in Europe. But ten years later, thecost has become the lowest in the world. Japan’scapability in IT technology has made it possible.However, this point has not been adequatelyappreciated. Communication charges have becomemuch lower and people seem to think that data comingfrom the network is free of charge. This situation iscausing a variety of problems. How can it be worthwhilefor IT engineers to work in such a situation?

Yamane: It has just been over 10 years since theInternet age began. Here I would like to ask you,President Miyahara, to make positive advances inInternet technologies which will establish over the next10 or 20 years an Internet with closer similarities to thehuman life. I am anticipating that NICT will makebreakthrough innovations which will change the worldin the true sense of the term.

By the way, one of my great expectations for NICT’sefforts is quantum communication, because NICT is theworld’s top runner in this field. Quantumcommunication is a technology which matches well withmankind’s travels out into the universe, and it will alsodramatically enable more robust communicationsecurity. I am hopeful that NICT will accomplish toopen up a new era of communication, which will resultin changes not seen since the radio wave communicationsystem was established by Marconi.Miyahara: At our research laboratories in Kobe, wehave some bioscience researchers who are doingresearch on the brain. They have started a new projectwith IT engineers to open up new paradigms andinnovations. Yamane: Oh, that’s excellent! Right now I’m trying outsome experiments with goldfish, and I am really leaninga lot from it. I worked on an experiment tapping tentimes on the glass wall of the aquarium before feeding.After 10 days of this activity, the goldfish came up tothe surface when I tapped ten times on the glass. They

have an amazing capacity for learning. I was reallysurprised to see that they could find a piece of foodwhich dropped to the bottom of the aquarium withoutany mixing it up with other objects. Olfactoryinformation should be blocked in water and I wonderhow it is possible for them to make such distinctions.We have a lot of things to learn from living beings suchas a goldfish.Miyahara: Living beings are wonderful, I agree. Ascientist I knew was studying Bengalese finches. Theywere originally southern wild birds. After they becamehuman pets, they acquired the ability to sing intricatelymelodious songs. This meant that their ability to acquireappropriate females increased. Why should that happen?My friend told me that the change occurred when theywere released from the stress of predation. The easy lifemade fine singers out of them.Yamane: (Smiling) Ah, so, if my stress level goesdown, will I be better at Karaoke? By the way, Googlehas released a new internet browser and it looks liketaking the Internet by storm, but I think Google’s aim issimply to develop a browser which is advantageous forits business. What do you think? The Internet browser isnow a necessary item in our daily lives, but I would behappier if browsers or the Internet had some newfunctions, such as the browser’s appearance becoming asepia color for older data just as old paper browns, or afiltering function which could indicate at a glance thatpeople have reacted favorably to some particular data.Miyahara: We are now studying such functions in anattempt to develop interfaces which are truly user-friendly. The point is how to design an IT system whichincorporates human sensitivity.Yamane: I look forward very much to seeing the resultsof your efforts.One thing more, when we are browsing data on theInternet, in 99% of the cases there is no sound. Ofcourse, I know that many video sites, like YouTube,enjoy their immense popularity, but most sites consistonly of text, photos, and other graphics. It’s the same ase-mail. Some sites have strange sound effects, and Ihave to turn off the sound to avoid the awful cacophony,but I think sites with no sound are very inhuman.Miyahara: I read a book called Hito-wa Mitame-ga

Research to enhance the Internet “culture” in10 or 20 years…


90% (How You Look is90% of Who You Are) (byIchiro Takeuchi, in theShincho Shinsho series) inwhich the author saysthat only 10% of thetotal information can becommunicated by writtenlanguage, and the rest ofthe information is gainedthrough non-verbal factors,such as body language,

gestures, tone of voice, and facial expressions. An issuefacing the implementation of advanced interfaces is howto communicate this remaining 90% of the information. Yamane: On the other hand, another important issue ishow people with visual or hearing disabilities canacquire information as much as people with nodisabilities. Is this an important issue for NICT?Miyahara: You’re quite right. I think the valuesinherent in the sensitivity you mentioned are veryimportant.Yamane: (Smiling) Your remarks today do not reallyseem to be those of a digital communications specialist.Miyahara: It may look as if people would say of me,“Despite the fact that you are working for the Internet,information and communications and the like in digitalfield.” but I’m not so. Digital is always anapproximation of phenomena. Everything is reallyanalog.Yamane: A profound and explicit remark! I was alsounder the impression that NICT’s Japan Standard Timeatomic clock was digital, but I’ve heard that in actualfact the atomic clock is analog, is that right? Is itimpossible to fully digitalize the clock?Miyahara: Well, a clock itself cannot be made as ananalog device by virtue of its very nature. After all, theterm “digital” originally means “a finger,” and the termdigital can be applied only to countable things.However, the world is not built in a way that it can becounted “1, 2, 3…” on our “fingers”. For example,temperature, does not suddenly step down from 30℃ to29℃.Yamane: NICT is well known for its maintaining theJapan Standard Time, and that’s fine, but there is oneannoying problem I have in relation to clocks. The TVbroadcasting system is now in the process of changingfrom an analog to a digital system. As opportunities tosee One Seg and Full-Seg broadcasting increase, I wasreally astounded to note that there is a time lag. Therouting of TV data or the encoding and decodingcapacities cause a lag in the time when the video imagestake to reach their destination.

I’ve had a similar experience on the Web. When I waswatching a live broadcast of a space shuttle launch onthe Internet and the live coverage on CNN TV at thesame time, the space shuttle was launched on the Webabout 40 seconds after the successful launch on CNNTV. It was the first time that I realized that the “delay”on the Internet was so large.

Miyahara: Of course,encoding and decodingcause such delays, but thedelays are also generatedon the networks. TheInternet was originallymeant for data transmission,and it is not good at real-time communication, likethe telephone. The initialidea for the Internetallowed for some delaysin data transmission. The instant transmission of data orimages is a very vexing issue. The reason for that is lowdevelopment costs.Yamane: Very little money is spent on development.Miyahara: Yes, the Internet has become so widespreadbecause it is cheap. A certain degree of delay isacceptable and even quality lapses are allowed, becauseit is cheap. However, this level of services will not meetneeds of users, and if we continue on like this we willrun into technical limits. After I came here, NICT beganresearch on NWGN (New Generation Network), or whatthe Internet will look like 10 years after.Yamane: Is this an extension of the existing research?Miyahara: No. We have started from scratch.Yamane: Amazing!Miyahara: Synchronization of all transmitted data,transmitting higher-quality images, and integratingcommunications and broadcasting in order for billionsof families to enjoy Hi-Vision quality visuals, all ofthese things will never be possible on the currentnetwork system.Yamane: Never possible?Miyahara: That’s why we decided that a new paradigmwas necessary and so have started up the new project.Yamane: If this research advances on NWGN so thatwe can get a better idea of what human-to-humancommunication is, or what information it is that wereally want to communicate, and if this new networkbecomes a tool with the power to help create a moredesirable world, that will be really wonderful.Miyahara: The information systems which we createshould make for moreactive human-to-humancommunications. Therer e a l l y i s n ’ t m u c hpoint in creating aninformation systemwhich pays no attentionto human-to-humancommunications.


concentration in the atmosphere.NICT has pursued the research and development of a

laser sensor to measure CO2 concentration, which canmonitor the spatial distribution of CO2 concentrationfrom a remote location, both day and night.

NICT has previously developed laser sensors toobserve wind profiles. We have been using a laser beamof a wavelength of 2 microns, which is safe for eyes (notharmful if the laser light hits the human eye), to observewind profiles. We found that this wavelength of the laserwas also very suitable for monitoring CO2. Severalabsorption lines of interesting atmospheric molecules,such as CO2, are included within the wavelength rangeof this laser. By controlling the wavelengths of laserpulses which blink only for a very short time, the sensordevice sends out pulse laser beams of two wavelengths

Kohei MizutaniResearch Manager,Environment Sensingand Network Group,AppliedElectromagneticResearch Center

After completing his graduatecourse, followed by a period as aJSPS (Japan Society for thePromotion of Science) Fellow, he

joined the Communications Research Laboratory (currently NICT) in1993. He has been engaged in the research concerning opticalmetrology and laser remote sensing. He is also a guest professor atthe Tokyo Metropolitan University. He has a Ph.D. in science.

●P r o f i l e●

Research and Development of a Laser Sensor to MeasureCarbon Dioxide

Remote Sensor forthe Observation ofGreenhouse Gases

It is believed that increased emissions of greenhousegases to the atmosphere, caused by mass fossil fuelconsumption and deforestation, are responsible forglobal warming. Among these greenhouse gasses, CO2

has the largest impact. Sixty percent of CO2 emitted byhuman activities is estimated to remain in theatmosphere without being absorbed in oceans or lands,its impact continuing for as long as a hundred years.This is the reason why we should reduce CO2 emissionsby half immediately. Due to the possible enormoushardship caused by such a radical reduction initiative, itis important to achieve the reduction of CO2 emissionsas effectively as possible. For the planning of effectiveCO2 emissions reduction measures, accurate estimatesand evaluations concerning individual emission sourcesand sinks are required, leading to a necessity fortechnologies to measure the spatial distribution of CO2

CO2 is the largest contributor to the greenhouse effect

Observation by a 2 micron laser sensor

Fig.1: Principle of a Laser Sensor to Measure Carbon Dioxide. Byobserving the reflected intensity of laser pulses of both strongabsorption wavelength and weak absorption wavelength, thesensor measures the distribution of CO2 molecules within acertain range based on the absorption difference between thesetwo wavelengths.

Note:LD Pumped and Conductive-Cooled Solid State LaserLD is an abbreviation for Laser Diode, which is a semiconductorlaser. The LD pumped and conductive-cooled solid state laser is atype of laser which generates laser oscillation by pumping solidlaser rods with LD beams, conducts laser rod heat away throughconductive cooling, and has excellent durability andmaintainability features.

Aerosol

CO2

Received Intensity

Range

Two-way Telescope

Detector

LD Pumped and Conductive-Cooled SolidState Laser

R1R2

λonλoff


alternately into the atmosphere:the on-line, which is stronglyabsorbed by CO2, and the off-line, which is close to the on-line, but is not absorbed by CO2

(Fig. 1).We can identify where the

received light reflected byaerosols (particles, dust, and soon) in the atmosphere isreturning from by the timeelapsed since transmission ofthe laser pulse. Furthermore,since on-line laser light isabsorbed by CO2 on both theiroutgoing and return journeys,the farther away the laser lighttravels and returns, the weakerit becomes. By comparing the intensity between thereceived on-line and off-line lights, the distribution ofCO2 concentration can be measured. We use an LDpumped and conductive-cooled solid state laser called a“Tm, Ho: YLF Laser” (YLF is LiYF4, and is read asLithium Yttrium Fluoride) for this device (Ref. Fig. 1).

There is no more powerful 2 micron-conductive-cooled solid state laser oscillator than the NICT laser.

Fig. 3 shows an overall view of the system. Thesystem consists of a telescope and laser mounted on anoptical bench. This was installed at the Headquarters inKoganei for the above-mentioned observation. Fig. 4shows the horizontal CO2 concentration distributionwithin a range of 1.5 km. We can find that CO2 is highlyconcentrated close to the ground from evening to night,but becomes lower in daytime due to mixing of theatmosphere and the impact of plant photosynthesis. Asshown in the figure, the laser sensor developed by NICTallows us to observe the CO2 concentration distributionup to a range of 2 km. We intend to advance thisresearch and development in order to be able to measurethe CO2 concentration distribution more precisely andover longer distances. Furthermore, in its current

configuration, this system is not sufficiently compact tobe portable for making observations in locations outsidethe laboratory. To respond to this requirement, we willdevelop a more compact device, which can betransported by car or airplane. It would indeed beinteresting if we could measure the CO2 concentrationdistribution in urban areas, or load the device onto anairplane and observe the changes in the CO2

concentration distribution all around the Japaneseislands and the surrounding areas.

Next year, two satellites will be launched, from Japanand the United States, to observe global CO2

concentration distribution. The devices installed in thesesatellites do not contain their own light source. We hopeto use the laser sensor for CO2 measurement developedby NICT to validate the data collected by thesesatellites, and contribute to the improvement of theirdata quality. Furthermore, the technologies which wehave developed will serve as the basic technology forsensors to be installed in future satellites. We also intendto make these devices more compact and easy to operateso that the 2 micron-laser sensor technology developedby NICT will come to be used by many people.

The current status and future of CO2

concentration distribution observationAiming to develop a more easy-to-use device

Fig.4: Horizontal Observation of CO2 Concentration Distribution

Fig.3: Laser Sensor System for CO2 Measurement in the Laboratory

This is the laserrod

Fig.2:Tm, Ho: YLF Laser RodThe Laser Rod (acrystal of Tm, Ho: YLF)is cooled to -80°C andpumped by LD (LaserDiode).

▲ Laser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser BeamLaser Beam

TransmissionMirror

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TransmissionMirror TelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescopeTelescope

Laser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser HeadLaser Head

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The number of household optical fiber access servicesubscribers has increased to over 10 million, and thetotal estimated internet traffic (total traffic volume) hasgrown to almost one terabit per second (1012 = 1000gigabits per second). Optical fiber communicationtechnology was employed commercially approximately20 years ago by using the optical intensity modulationtechnique to transmit binary digital information signals,namely “1” and “0,” to indicate that light is on and off,respectively. In 1989, the first-ever internationalcommunication service via optical submarine cables wasstarted between Japan and USA. However, theinformation transmission capacity per fiber at that timewas not significant—specifically, 280 megabits persecond (the order of 108 bits per second)—almost equalto that supported by the optical fiber access servicecurrently provided to each household. This implies thatthe information transmission volume has grown nearly10,000 times within 20 years.

Various innovative new technologies have beendeveloped and put into practical application in order toaccommodate rapidly increasing traffic demands; suchtechnologies include wavelength division multiplexing(WDM) systems that multiplex multiple wavelengthscontaining individually modulated optical informationsignals into a single optical fiber; and optical fiberamplification technologies that act as repeater amplifiersfor wavelength multiplexed optical signals withoutrequiring electrical termination for regeneration.

Previously, the increase in demand for traffic hadbeen resolved by increasing the optical On/Off rate (bitrate) per wavelength channel and the WDM channelnumber; however, such conventional technologies alonecannot be employed to meet the current fast-growing

demand. If we insist only on increasing the bit rate, thefollowing problems occur: (1) Optical signals sufferserious distortion during transmission via optical fibercharacteristics; (2) In order to avoid interferencebetween neighboring channels due to overlapping ofwavelength bandwidth per wavelength channel, channelspacing must be increased; and (3) As a result, all thewavelength channels demanded cannot beaccommodated within the limited amplificationbandwidth of the optical fiber amplifier.

Immediate development of technologies to transmitinformation in a highly efficient manner has becomecritical. Because more than one bit of information peroptical pulse (per time slot) cannot be transmitted byusing an optical on/off scheme alone, research anddevelopment on multi-level optical transmissiontechnologies that can transmit two or more bits of digitalinformation per optical pulse by conveying informationalso on phases (angles), another characteristic of opticalwaves, is, extremely important.

As shown in Fig. 1, by using the status of a phaseplane that has four (22) phases (four levels) with anangular separation at each right angle, if information isassigned using the four angles, 00, 01, 11, and 10, twobits of information can be transmitted per time slot, thusallowing the transmission of information with greaterspeed and efficiency.

Furthermore, by combining the intensity and phasecharacteristics, 4 bits of information with 16 (24) levels,and 6 bits with 64 (26) levels in one time slot (in thesame bandwidth) (Fig. 2) can be transmitted. By usingthis technology, even if traffic demands significantlyincrease, it will be possible to transmit double, fourfold,sixfold, and higher volumes of information signals viathe same bandwidth per channel. In other words, thewavelength bandwidth occupied by a certain volume ofinformation transmission can be compressed to half,one-fourth, and one-sixth (bandwidth compression).

Evolution of OpticalCommunicationtowards High SpectralDensity TransmissionTechnologies

Tetsuya MiyazakiGroup Leader, PhotonicNetwork Group, NewGeneration NetworkResearch Center

Tetsuya Miyazaki received theM.S. and Dr. Eng. degrees fromthe Tokyo Institute of Technologyin 1987 and 1997, respectively. Hejoined KDD (currently KDDI) R&DLabs, where he was engaged in

the research and development of coherent optical communicationsystems and WDM optical networks. In 2002, he moved to theCommunications Research Laboratory (currently NICT), where hehas been engaged in ultra-fast and multi-level modulationtechniques.

●P r o f i l e●

Information traffic demand has increased10,000 times during 20 years

R&D on multi-level optical transmissiontechnologies to be extremely critical

Conventional technology has reached its limits


Multi-level transmission technologies have alreadybeen implemented in the practical application ofwireless communication systems such as mobile phones.However, in order to realize multi-level transmissions,particularly with 16 or more levels, by using opticalfiber transmissions, several technological issues must beresolved.

I would like to introduce a technology that can beemployed for canceling phase-noise and waveformdistortion, which is being studied by our research group.In multi-level optical transmissions, which employ bothintensity and phase characteristics of optical waves, thelarger the multi-level number, the more necessary it is toreduce the amplitude and phase distortion (noise) of theoptical wave in order to transmit the informationaccurately (Fig. 2). To solve this problem, wesuccessfully developed a unique noise cancellingtechnique, which is analogous to headphones allowingus to enjoy music even in very noisy places.

Fig. 3 shows the measurement results of phase planesbefore and after application of the proposed noisecanceling technology to a 64-level (6 bits/optical pulse)multi-level optical transmission.

By applying the proposed noise and waveformdistortion canceling technology, the phase plane status(constellation) is significantly improved, thus enablingus to observe 64 stars blinking clearly, from supernovaexplosion-like constellations. This confirms that the

information can be accurately transmitted. Applying ourmulti-level optical transmission technology to WDMtransmission systems will provide wavelengthbandwidth compression per channel to achieve highspectral efficiency. Even if traffic demands grow rapidly,increase in electrical power consumption in cascadedoptical-repeater-amplifier transmission systems can besuppressed.

Practical applications of highly efficient multi-leveloptical transmissions continue to face challenges thatmust be resolved, such as the development of low-noiselaser optical sources, ultrafast low-distortionmodulators, as well implementation of the noise anddistortion canceling technology. We will proceed withour research activities in a stepwise manner in order toachieve a practical and integrated application of thevarious technologies mentioned above.

Achieving technologies for cancellation ofphase-noise and waveform distortion

Fig.1:Binary Optical Intensity Modulation and Four-Level OpticalPhase Modulation

Fig.2:Relationshipbetween OpticalWave Noise andDegree of Multi-Level

Fig.3:Measurement Results of Phase Planes with 64-Level Optical Wave Signalsbefore (Left) and after (Right) Application of the Proposed Noise andDistortion Canceling Technology

▲ Four-Level Optical Phase Modulation

Transmission in aShorter Time→More Efficient

Two-Level Optical Phase ModulationTime

Phase Plane

Intensity

TimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTimeTime

Noise

Four Levels Sixteen Levels Sixty-four Levels

NICTINTERVIEW


A Paper Created from an Innovative Idea isNow Attracting World Attention

Working towardsan Optical Deviceto Run on VeryLittle Energy

“Here at our institute, we are engaged in the researchand development which will be relevant to theinformation communications field in 10 or 20 yearsfrom now.” said Dr. Kazuyoshi Kurihara, ExpertResearcher, who is now promoting basic research on the“surface plasmon.” A surface plasmon is an opticalwave propagating on a metal surface. At the tip oftapered metallic waveguides smaller than the opticalwavelength, the plasmon generates a strong electric fieldeven with a weak optical beam, which makes switchingpossible at very low energy. “If we use this mechanism,we maybe are able to create an optical switch with farlower energy consumption than that of conventionalmodels.” These ideas are said to have recently beenattracting attention, especially in Europe and the UnitedStates.

Previously, these phenomena could not be described bymathematical formulas. However, Dr. Kurihara solved thisproblem with a new method. His two papers (J. Phys. A 40(2007) 12479 & J. Phys. A 41 (2008) 295401) werepublished in an academic journal of the Institute of Physics

(IOP). According to Dr. Kurihara, a large number ofcritical comments were sent back to him by the referees atthe screening stage for the first paper. “Inelectromagnetics, we use the separation of variablesmethod to solve a partial differentiation equation, but Iproposed a new method, in which we used incompletevariable separation of variables, which had rarely beenused before, to solve the question.” Consequently, thesecond paper shortly after the first one was highlyevaluated, and also was published in the “IOP Select,” forwhich the IOP selects papers from more than 60 journalsissued by the IOP.

Dr. Kurihara joined NICT four years ago. At thebeginning of his career at this institute, he was engaged inthe research on neutral atomic cooling systems. Since heoriginally had basic knowledge about the surface plasmonfrom studying bio-sensors, he began his current researchabout two and half years ago. “It was that a problem whichcould be solved, but which no one had yet tried to solve,just came to me by chance, rather than that I had to forcemyself to solve that problem. Since I had not been engagedin pure physics during my career, it was easier for me toapproach the problem with new ideas,” He notes that itwas due to the excellent research environment at theAdvanced ICT Research Center, where it is possible toconcentrate on research in comfortable conditions withoutbeing interrupted by small jobs, that he was able to write apaper good enough to be included in the IOP Select.

Making possible optical switches with farlower energy consumption

Despite many critical comments, our paperhighly evaluated

Kazuyoshi Kurihara,Ph.D.

Expert Researcher, Nano ICT Group, Kobe Advanced ICTResearch Center, having completed his doctoral course atthe University of Tokyo. And after working as a researcherat the Kanagawa Academy of Science and Technology, hejoined the National Institute of Information andCommunications Technology in 2004. He was engaged inR&D concerning semiconductor excited laserspectrometry, near-field optical microscopes, and surfaceplasmon resonance sensors.

●P r o f i l e●

PRIZEWINNERS'PROFILES


PRIZE WINNERS' PROFILES

Tetsuya Ido

Youzo Syouji

Koumei Sugiura

Yoshitoshi Murata

Tomoyuki Mishina

Liu Juan

Hideaki Furukawa

Takanori Seno

Koumei Sugiura

Hironori Iwai

Hiroshi Harada, Shuzo Kato, Mikio Hasegawa, Homare Murakami

Ryutaro Oi, Makoto Okui

Hiroshi Ando

Naoya Wada, Tetsuya Miyazaki

Young Scientist Award

Young Scientist Award

Championship ofRoboCup @Home LeagueThe best paper award, "Innovations inNGN" Kaleidoscope AcademicConference Genova,12-13 May 2008

2007 HODIC Suzuki-Okada Prize

The Best Paper Award

IEICE Photonic NetworkResearch Award

The Best Paper Award

First Place inRoboCup@Home

Hirono Award

PRIZE WINNER GROUP OFPARTICIPATOR

NAME OFWINNING PRIZE

◎DATE：4.15.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：Young Scientist Award

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：Laser Cooling and Recoil-free High ResolutionSpectroscopy of NeutralStrontium Atoms

◎NAME OF GROUP：Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science& Technology

◎Comment by the Winner：I'm very happy to have the honor of winning this

excellent prize for the research results concerningmillimeter waves. I have been engaged in this researchfor eight years since I joined the institute. First of all, I'dlike to extend my sincere gratitude to Dr. Hiroyo Ogawa,the former Executive Director of the New GenerationWireless Communication Research Center, who constantlyprovided valuable instructions, which I believe led to theaward of this prize, for my research and developmentconcerning millimeter waves. I would also like to extendmy sincere gratitude to Dr. Hiroshi Harada, Leader of theUbiquitous Mobile Group, and to my co-researchers.

Senior Researcher, Space-Time Standards Group, New Generation NetworkResearch Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Tetsuya Ido

◎DATE：4.15.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：Young Scientist Award

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：Research on High-efficiency Millimeter-waveCommunicationsTechnology in WirelessCommunications Engineering Area

◎NAME OF GROUP：Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science& Technology

◎Comment by the Winner：Recoilless high-resolution spectroscopy precisely makes use of the same

principles as the‘optical lattice clock,’ an optical atomic clock systemdeveloped in Japan. I heard that this prize was awarded because after theverification of these principles in Japan and the subsequent realization ofthe clock’s performance in the United States, the optical lattice clock wasadopted as the“secondary expression of the second”by the committee,“LeComite′ Intemational des Poids et Mesures”in French. A“secondaryexpression”in the field of optics is equivalent to becoming a potentialcandidate for redefining the second in the near future. On the occasion ofthis award, not only would I like to extend my sincere gratitude to allthose who have supported my research up to this time, but also renew mycommitment to realizing an international standard with this system.

Senior Researcher, Space Communication Group, New Generation WirelessCommunications Research Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Youzo Syouji



◎DATE：5.27.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：The Best Paper Award

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：Emotion Eliciting andDecision Making byPsychodynamic AppraisalMechanism

◎NAME OF GROUP：IEEE Human System Interaction Conference2008

◎Comment by the Winner：I am very glad to win the Best Paper Award in thisIEEE Conference for interactions between humanbeings and systems. In this paper, I modeled the rolesthat emotions play during the development ofrecognition and interactions with human beings. In thefuture, I would like to develop further this model, andclarify the emotional recognition mechanism in moredetail in order to work towards the development of thetechnology to convey emotional information.

Research Expert, Multimodal Communication Group, Universal MediaResearch Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Liu JuanGROUP OF PARTICIPATOR Hiroshi Ando

◎DATE：5.5.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNING PRIZE：Championship of RoboCup @Home League

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNING PRIZE：eR@sers (Team name)

◎NAME OF GROUP：RoboCup Japan 2008 Numazu Host Committee

◎Comment by the Winner：In order to demonstrate the performance of the

unregistered language learning technology, weparticipated in this competition as a joint team withTamagawa University and The University of Electro-Communications, and won the championship in the@home league, the section for domestic robots.

Research Expert, Spoken Language Communication Group, KnowledgeCreating Communication Research Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Koumei Sugiura

◎DATE：5.13.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：The best paper award,"Innovations in NGN"Kaleidoscope AcademicConference Genova,12-13May 2008

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：ARCHITECTURE AND BUSINESS MODEL OFOPEN HETEROGENEOUS MOBILE NETWORK

◎NAME OF GROUP：The Telecommunication Standardization Sectorof ITU(ITU-T)

◎Comment by the Winner：I am very glad to receive an award this time because Ihave never received an award as a main researcher formore than ten years. I knew that there was a possibilitysince I had been nominated in advance to receive thisaward. However, quite honestly I was very surprised whenmy name was actually called. By participating in theconference and finding that there were several other papersbesides ours which emphasized user oriented services, I feltquite strongly that“the CWC concept is correct!”

Expert Researcher, Ubiquitous Mobile Communication Group, NewGeneration Wireless Communications Research Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Yoshitoshi MurataGROUP OF PARTICIPATOR Hiroshi Harada, Shuzo Kato, Mikio Hasegawa, Homare Murakami

◎DATE：5.23.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNING PRIZE：2007 HODIC Suzuki-Okada Prize

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNING PRIZE：Electronic holography for real object usinghologram calculated from integral photography

◎NAME OF GROUP：Holographic Display Artists and Engineers Club

◎Comment by the Winner：We have been pursuing the research of electronic

holography, a field of holography using electricalmethodology, aiming to apply the holography, whichmakes natural stereoscopic displays adaptible tostereoscopic televisions and communication media. Thistime, by making calculations from the images taken by acompound multifaceted lens (integral imaging), we haveachieved the electronic holography replay of live-actionvideos, which hadpreviously been difficultto realize. We nowintend to continue ourresearch to make morenatural and realisticstereoscopic displaysavailable.

Research Expert, 3D Spatial Image and Sound Group, Universal MediaResearch Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Tomoyuki MishinaGROUP OF PARTICIPATOR Ryutaro Oi, Makoto Okui



◎DATE：6.12.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：IEICE Photonic NetworkResearch Award

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：IP over Optical PacketSwitch Network with Novel10Gigabit-Ethernet/80Gbit/s-Optical-Packet Converter

◎NAME OF GROUP：Technical Committee on Photonic Network ofIEICE

◎Comment by the Winner：I'm extremely honored to receive this dignified award, the PNResearch Prize in 2007. I would like to extend my sincere gratitudeto Dr. Tetsuya Miyazaki, Leader of our group and the coauthor ofthe award-winning lecture, our Research Manager Dr. NaoyaWada, and other members of our group who have supported me inmany ways. The award-winning research is a report concerningthe interface connecting the next generation optical packet switchnetwork and the existing IP network. With this award as aspringboard, I hope to be able to make further contributions to thepractical application of optical packet switches.

Expert Researcher, Photonic Network Group, New Generation NetworkResearch Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Hideaki FurukawaGROUP OF PARTICIPATOR Naoya Wada, Tetsuya Miyazaki

◎DATE：6.21.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：The Best Paper Award

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：A Study on DisparityCompensated Predictionfor Multi-view Video

◎NAME OF GROUP：The Institute of Image Electronics Engineers ofJapan

◎Comment by the Winner：We began this study inspired by the start of the

initiative to create coding standards for multiple-viewvideos in the MPEG group, an affiliate under the ISO. Inthis study, we raised the estimate accuracy by integratingthe compensation based on affine transformation with theexisting estimate, which was mainly based on paralleltranslation. We spent half a year validating the systemmathematically, and another half a year validating itsefficiency by experiments. This has been one of the mostmemorable papers for us. Encouraged by this award, I amcommitted to continuing research which will be bothmeaningful and useful for society.

Expert Researcher, 3D Spatial Image and Sound Group, Universal MediaResearch Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Takanori Seno

◎DATE：9.12.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNING PRIZE：Hirono Award

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNING PRIZE：Doppler Lidar Observations of Downslope Wind“Zao-oroshi”

◎NAME OF GROUP：Laser Radar Society of Japan

◎Comment by the Winner：The Hirono Prize, a new prize for the encouragementof younger researchers initiated this year, was foundedin the name of the late Dr. Motokazu Hirono, a pioneerof the observation of stratospheric aerosols by lasers,and who also belonged to the Radio ResearchLaboratory, the former institute of NICT. I feelextremely honored and humbled to receive this prize. Ipledge continuing commitment to my research, andwould like to takethis opportunityalso to extend mysincere gratitudeto everyone whoprovided me withkind support duringthe observationexperiments.

Researcher, Environment Sensing and Network Group, AppliedElectromagnetic Research Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Hironori Iwai

◎DATE：7.20.2008

◎NAME OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：First Place inRoboCup@Home

◎CONTENTS OF THE WINNINGPRIZE：eR@sers (Team name)

◎NAME OF GROUP：RoboCup Federation

◎Comment by the Winner：Following the Japanese competition, we participated

in the world RoboCup competition. In the preliminaryscreening session, our high-precision voice recognitiontechnology working under a noise environment helpedus to gain a high score. In the final screening session,the demonstration of unregistered language learningtechnology, which had been unavailable in conventionalrobots, was highly evaluated and enabled us to becomethe overall champion.

Research Expert, Spoken Language Communication Group, KnowledgeCreating Communication Research Center

PRIZE WINNER ●Koumei Sugiura

A Lot of Surprises! The Most Leading Edge Technology!


As an outcome of our long-term continuingresearch exchanges with the YokosukaResearch Park (YRP) and AalborgUniversity, Denmark, a Japanese laboratoryof the CTIF (Center for TeleInFrastruktur),a research and education organization of theuniversity in the ICT field principallyincluding mobile communications, wasestablished in the premises of the YRP.On October 3, 2008, an opening ceremony,commemorating the foundation of CTIF-Japan, was held at the Hotel Pacific Tokyo inMinato Ward, Tokyo, Japan.As a global organization with laboratoriesin Italy, India, and Copenhagen in Demark,CTIF has been pursuing internationalcollaborative activities to contribute toresearch and development, education, andtechnological innovation concerning ICT.CTIF-Japan aims at the co-development of

world-leading ICT solutions throughinternational collaboration. The Japanesecenter is expected to take a role as a globalportal site to the industries, academicorganizations, and standard-settingorganizations, via joint-research activitieswith the collaborating European universities.Dr. Omori, Vice President of NICT, who isVice Chairperson of the YRP R&D PromotionCommittee, was inaugurated as the firstExecutive Director of CTIF-Japan. At thecommemorative ceremony, Dr. Omori gavean outline of CTIF-Japan, and a tape-cuttingceremony was performed by the dignitaryparticipators. After that, congraturatoryaddresses were given by Dr. HideoMiyahara, President of NICT; the DanishAmbassador to Japan; the ParliamentarySpeaker of the North Jutland Region ofDenmark and other guests.

●Dr . Omor i 's Inaugurat ion Speech as Execut iveDirector of CTIF-Japan

●D r . M i y a h a r a , P r e s i d e n t o f N I CT , S p e a k i n gCongratulatory Address

●Tape-Cutting Ceremony

●P r e s s I n t e r v e i w : ( f r om l e f t ) P r o f . P r a s a d o f A a l b o r gUniversity; President Kjearsdam of Aalborg University; Hon.Me l l b in , Ambassador to Japan ; D r . Hato r i , Cha i rpe rsonEmeritus of YRP; Dr. Omori, Executive Director of CTIF-Japan


On January 1, 2009, one“leap second”will be added to the day for the first time in three years.Previously, astronomical time based on the Earth’s revolution and rotation was used as standard time. Today,extremely accurate atomic clocks, based on atomic vibration, are used to determine standard time. This,however, has led to discrepancies between atomic time and astronomic time. Due to this discrepancy, the time adjusted to maintain the difference between the time based on the atomicclock and the time based on astronomical time to within +－0.9 seconds is used as the world standard time. Theadjustment requiring the insertion of a“leap second”is planned because the discrepancy with the time basedon the Earth's revolution and rotation is approaching 0.9 seconds. The last leap second insertion was performedthree years ago, on January 1, 2006. These adjustments are decided by the International Earth Rotation andReference Systems Service (IERS), which carries out global observations concerning the Earth’s rotation.

【The Upcoming Adjustment (Japan Standard Time)】Thursday, January 1, 2009

On this occasion, one second will be inserted after 8:59:59 a.m. to indicate 8:59:60,followed by 9:00:00.

Besides, for further information, please refer to the following page on the NICT Website,“Q&A on the LeapSecond”: http://jjy.nict.go.jp/index-e.html (Partially in Japanese)

■This“NICT News”is the 373th issue, but it is also the first issue in the renewed format. We have redesignedthe overall layout and are aiming at a wider readership. We hope that you will enjoy reading future issues ofthis newsletter.■In the upcoming issue, we will be featuring“MASTAR Project,”as the comprehensive project promoting theresearch into voice and language processing systems, including language speech translation, machinetranslation, and voice interactive systems.

Relation among International Atomic Time (TAI), Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), Astronomical Time (Universal Time, UT1) and the Leap Second

Oct. 2008 No. 373

Published by

Public Relations Office, Strategic Planning DepartmentNational Institute of Information and CommunicationsTechnology

Editorial Cooperation: Japan Space Forum

4-2-1 Nukui-Kitamachi, Koganei, Tokyo 184-8795, JapanTel: (042) 327-5392 Fax: (042) 327-7587E-mail: [email protected]: http://www.nict.go.jp/index.html

At 00:00:00 on January 1, 1972, the difference betweenInternational Atomic Time (TAI) and CoordinatedUniversal Time (UTC) was adjusted to be 10 seconds.

Old Coorrdinated Universal Time

Special Adjustment

Universal Time(UT1)

〈Recycled paper used〉

“One Second” Longer than Usualon the First Day in Next Year

Atomic time approximated to UT usingstandard frequency offsets and timeadjustments from 1961 to 1971（thelength of 1 sec is different from that ofInternational Atomic Time [TAI]）

Adjustments with steps of 1 sec to prevent the differencebetween Universal Time 1 (UT1) and CoordinatedUniversal Time (UTC) from exceeding ±0.9 sec.

Leap Second Adjustments

Universal Time (UT): Time determined based onobservation of the Earth’s rotation. There are threeversions: UT0, UT1, and UT2, if classified in detail

International Atomic Time (TAI)

Atomic Time approximated to UT1 by the‘leapsecond’adjustments（the length of 1 sec is thesame as that of International Atomic Time [TAI]）,instead of the offset system which was abolishedin 1972.

Coorrdinated Universal Time (UTC)

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