Hyogo plans volunteer support center
Hyogo Prefecture has announced a basic idea to establish a Volunteer Activities Support Center (tentative name) to help the operations of nonprofit organizations (NPOs) in the private sector. The center will be the first of its kind in Japan.The center will include an NPO College (tentative name) to offer training courses, including management programs for NPO leaders. It will also have a think tank for research and policy proposals as well as an information plaza to gather and provide data regarding domestic and foreign NPO activities using multimedia. In addition, a fund will be set up to stabilize and strengthen NPO financial foundations.
To assist in fund raising and securing human resources, the center will supply information on NPO activities to prospective contributors and others. At the same time, it is expected to help develop a basis for flexible and efficient NPO activities for emergency assistance, restoration and rebuilding in times of disaster, and for disaster preparation during ordinary times.
The center will be built at the end of fiscal 2000 in a new urban area in the eastern part of Kobe. Operations will be self-managed and independent of governments. Plans will be drafted by the end of fiscal 1997.
Osaka group guides lightning using laser
In a world's first, a joint research group from Kansai Electric Power Co., Osaka University and the other institution has successfully used a laser beam to guide lightning toward a lightning rod in outdoor experiments.In the technique, a high-powered laser is pulsed in the vicinity of a thunder cloud. This creates a plasma which acts as an easy path for electricity to travel through the air, the aim being to guide the lightning strike to a safe location.
The successful experiments were carried out in Mihama Town, Fukui Prefecture, using a pair of CO2 gas lasers capable of generating pulsed laser light with a power output of 20 million kilowatts and a pulse duration of one-20 millionth of a second. The two pulsed beams were reflected off a pair of converging mirrors so that the laser light created a plasma in the air at the tip as well as in the region above a 50 meter-tall lightning rod. Lightning currents of as much as 35 kiloamperes were measured, which is above average.
Over half of the power transmission line power failures suffered by Kansai Electric are due to lightning strikes.
These successful experiments, and the technologies developed for the tests, constitute an important foothold in the effort to realize a practical way of preventing lightning strikes.
Kyoto music festival to feature top artists
The Kyoto Autumn Music Festival '97 will be held from October 11 through November 29 featuring world renowned artists, the Kyoto municipal government announced. The main venue of the festival will be the Kyoto City Concert Hall, which opened in the autumn of 1995 as a center for classical music and music culture of Kyoto.Guest artists will include the Beaux Arts Trio of France, considered one of the world's finest chamber music ensemble. Concerts by violinist Thomas Brandis, the long-time concert master of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, and Christian Zacharias, a top pianist of German-Austrian music, are other highlights.
During the festival, the Kyoto Symphony Orchestra conducted by Peter Gülke of Germany will offer a special performance as well as its regular program. The orchestra will also present a joint performance with the Prague Symphony Orchestra.
In the Kyoto International Music Session 1997, Thomas Brandis will provide a 6-day workshop while Christian Zacharias will offer a 6-day course in piano and chamber music. Both are designed for young musicians. The festival, the first of what is planned to become a regular event, is aimed at promoting Kyoto to the rest of the world as an international music center.
Osaka plans 'video business park'
The city of Osaka has revealed a plan to attract video information-related industries to the environs around Universal Studios Japan (USJ), which is scheduled to open its doors in the spring of 2001.The plan was put forward by a study committee on information industry concentration in the Konohana district, comprising city officials, industry representatives and university professors.
A wide variety of industries are expected to benefit and advance through the concentration in the area of the types of video information industries and enterprises which can provide USJ with needed technologies and human resources.
The goal is to create a "video business park," providing capabilities for video production and distribution, for research into the technological uses of video, for industrial support and training, and for the nurturing of human resources and exchanges.
In order to bring together these various capabilities, a number of facilities are deemed necessary. These include a television station and movie production company; a center where technologies and products can be turned into videos, such as a video catalog of industrial goods; and various educational facilities, including a graduate school for video and a technical school. Also proposed is a digital movie festival.
MEI makes new system for sign language
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. (MEI) said it has developed the world's first noncontact sign language recognition system. The system utilizes stereo cameras to capture the image of the hand signal, and compares this with a database of hand signs in a manner similar to referencing words in a dictionary.The company's ultimate goal is development of a sign language interpretation system that can help facilitate smooth communication with the hearing and speech-impaired.
Other sign language recognition systems have been developed based on the use of a data glove, which is equipped with sensors for each finger and is connected via cables to a computer. But this setup places restrictions on hand movements, and there are also problems concerning hygiene in public facilities, where any number of different people would be wearing the same glove.
With the new technology, signing is recognized solely with the help of a pair of stereo cameras, eliminating the need for special equipment. The system can accommodate signing by any person.
MEI is conducting research with the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications and a university to develop a sign language communication system. The goal is to have prototypes ready for use at post offices by the year 2000.
Osaka's ATC to present Greatest Insect Expo
The Asia and Pacific Trade Center in Osaka will hold The Greatest Insect Exposition to mark the 90th anniversary of Jean-Henri Fabre's completion of "Souvenirs entomologiques." The expo will open at the ATC Hall in Osaka July 27 and run through August 31.Displays will include about 30,000 insect specimens in 1,200 sample cases, many of which are rare species such as Dynastes hercules - the world's largest beetle - and Ornithoptera goliath - a swallowtail butterfly found in New Guinea. This will be one of the largest insect exhibitions ever held in the world.
The organizer will set up a number of zones for specific themes at the exhibition site, one of which will allow visitors to "experience nature with insects," where they can directly observe insects moving and acting naturally. Another will be an Insect Nature Park where natural environments for fireflies and dragonflies will be created within the site to let visitors have direct contact with those species.
Kansai in Focus: Observatory turns Misato's fortunes around
An observatory is transforming Misato-cho, Wakayama Prefecture, from a sleepy backwater into a town of the information age. Thirty-six percent of Misato's 4,000-plus population is elderly, and the town hall, with a 100 workers, is the only major employer in town.There is nothing else, except the sky - which is filled to overflowing with stars. When the Environment Agency conducted the national starry sky contest in 1987, Misato was chosen as having one of the most beautiful night skies in all of Japan. Hoping to turn this resource into a sightseeing attraction, the town built Misato Observatory. With its opening in 1995, Misato took its first step into the information age.
Misato Observatory has a reflecting telescope with a 105cm aperture, the largest in Japan among observatories open to the general public. The idea was to attract visitors with Japan's No. 1 telescope, but the man scouted to be the observatory's director thought differently. "You can't stay number one on the basis of your hardware," said Masami Okyudo. (And in fact, public observatories with 110cm-diameter reflecting telescopes will open in Tokushima and Hokkaido this year.) "To make Misato Observatory a well-known name, we need to enhance the software that will send information about our activities out to the world."
Okyudo made Internet access a major condition for his taking the job. This insistence was to have an enormous impact not only on the observatory, but on Misato as a whole. Last fall, Okyudo took on a second position in Misato to promote the town's computerization. All eight of the town's schools - elementary, junior and senior high - got onto the Internet last fiscal year, and four researchers from the observatory have been making the rounds to explain computer usage to students and teachers. Starting this year, Okyudo is a part-time instructor at a local high school, where he teaches astronomy and Internet use.
Meanwhile, a new program has been started to promote computer literacy among adults as well: two workers are chosen every year from the town hall's younger staff, to spend one year working in the observatory learning computer use. In fall this year, there will be a computer for every town hall worker, and in future Misato hopes to introduce terminals into every home.
That way, the workers who studied at the observatory can use their skills to promote computer literacy in the town at large. "By moving forward in the field of information, Misato has a good chance of getting into the spotlight in the 21st century," said Okyudo.
Misato-cho's observatory, built with the aim of attracting visitors, has become an institution promoting the town's computerization. Of course, the observatory remains a center for star-gazing and astronomical research, and its activities on this front are reported to the world on its Internet homepage.
For example, this year the observatory gained wide acclaim for its homepage's live transmission of such heavenly spectacles as a total eclipse of the sun and the Hale-Bopp comet.
Okyudo also created a stir in Chicago, where he took advantage of the 15-hour time difference with Japan to reproduce Misato's star-filled night sky in daylight, a feat that made him the subject of a big story in a local Chicago newspaper. Today, Misato Observatory is more famous abroad than in Japan.