Korea Institute of Civil Engineering and Building Technology (President Sun Kyu, Park) has developed ‘Generative AI-Based Inspection Technology' to safely construct and maintain urban underground highways.

Spatial economics is a relatively new area of economics, aiming to comprehensively analyze the spatial structures of economic activities that result from interactions between people and companies. Professor HAMAGUCHI Nobuaki, who works on global economy and economic integration at Kobe University’s Research Institute for Economics and Business Administration, specializes in spatial economics, and for over a span of 10 years has been visiting areas devastated by the Great East Japan Earthquake for his research. We asked him for his thoughts on recovery efforts from the perspective of spatial economics.

When trying to improve, refine, and seek more efficiency in disaster management measures, predicting the extent of disaster damage more accurately and communicating the assessments in a coherent manner become crucial elements for the task. This is why there are high hopes for the role of computational science, in particular simulations, and information technology in this endeavor. Professor OISHI Satoru, who specializes in social infrastructure and hydroengineering research at the Research Center for Urban Safety and Security, aims to help society change and enhance disaster resilience by building digital twins. We asked him what we can anticipate from the use of digital twin technology, and how it can contribute to disaster measures.

A cutting-edge project to test “fusion blanket” technologies is taking shape, with the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) leading the charge to create a critical component of a fusion reactor.

New Sanford Burnham Prebys scientist Ahmed Mahmoud, PhD, planned to complete his doctoral degree and enter the pharmaceutical industry to help teams develop new therapies. Once he got into the laboratory during his PhD studies, however, he became fascinated by regenerative biology.

Mahmoud was especially interested in the heart as damage to tissue and cells from heart attacks and chronic heart disease leaves permanent scars. Broken bones mend and split skin knits itself together, but damage to hearts only compounds and weakens cardiac muscle.

Mahmoud and his team focus on how to repair adult hearts by restoring the regenerative powers they once possessed early in development. He wants to advance the discoveries he has made in regenerating hearts in mice to develop treatments that may one day benefit patients.

Women's health has long been neglected, causing delayed diagnoses and poor care. Now, AI is transforming women's healthcare by improving decision making, accuracy, and treatment outcomes.

The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) is committed to promoting research excellence to address societal challenges and opportunities by providing strategic insights. In response to intensifying competition in the global shipping market, PolyU scholars have conducted a comprehensive study of Hong Kong’s shipping ecosystem and developed policy recommendations aimed at fostering collaborative efforts to enhance the shipping ecosystem within the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA). This project aligns with the long-term initiatives outlined in the 2024 Chief Executive Policy Address and has been supported under the Strategic Public Policy Research Funding Scheme (SPPRFS) 2024/25 of the Chief Executive’s Policy Unit of the HKSAR Government. This year, only two out of 37 applications received funding.

Assistant professor SAGA Tatsuya of the Graduate School of Human Development and Environment, who is captivated by hornets and is advancing the understanding of their ecology, has an unusual career path, having taught at public high schools for 10 years. After completing a master’s program, he became a high school teacher, took a leave of absence to pursue a doctoral program, and returned to high school teaching after completing his doctorate. During this time, he continued his research independently, and in his mid-30s, he made a fresh start by joining Kobe University to devote himself to research. It has been over two years since he relocated his research base to Kobe. We asked him about the research on hornet ecology he has conducted, the outcomes of this research, and the insights derived on fostering a better relationship between humans and nature.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — What if plastics could self-destruct when their time as a useful product ends? Scientists at Sandia National Laboratories are exploring this concept in one of their latest projects.