Energy. Entropy. Leadership.

Gerhard Fasol, Chair

9th Ludwig Boltzmann Forum 2017, Thursday 16 February 2017, at the Embassy of Austria in Tokyo

Program

• Welcome by the Ambassador of Austria
• Gerhard Fasol CEO, Eurotechnology Japan KK, Board Director, GMO Cloud KK. former faculty Cambridge University and past Fellow, Trinity College Cambridge
  “Entropy, information and Ludwig Boltzmann”
• Masato Wakayama Executive Vice-President & Trustee, Kyushu University, Distinguished Professor of Mathematics
  “Endeavors for Mathematics for Industry in Japan”
• Chuck Casto Licensed Nuclear Power Station Operator. Was NRC regulator responsible for 23 nuclear power stations. Leader of the US Integrated Government and NRC efforts in Japan during the Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011.
  “Balance of Nuclear Power Policy in Post-Fukushima Japan”
• Yayoi Kamimura INTEL, Global Account Executive, previously: NTT Docomo, Director and Head of Business Development & Investment
  “Innovation – A style in Japan”
• Minoru Koshibe Mitsui Chemicals, Executive Vice-President, health care business sector and other business sectors
  “Growth and innovation at Mitsui Chemicals”
• Makoto Suematsu President, Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development
  “AMED challenges for global data sharing”

The Ludwig Boltzmann Forum is invitation only. Contact us here if you are interested to discuss current or future events and cooperations:

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AMED challenges for global data sharing

Makoto Suematsu

keynote talk given at 9th Ludwig Boltzmann Forum, Embassy of Austria in Tokyo, 16 March 2017

by Makoto Suematsu, President, Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development (AMED)

Summary written by Gerhard Fasol

We share data in space science, why don’t we share data and expensive equipment in medicine?

AMED. Our Vision: to fast-track medical R&D. Create catalytic systems to fast-track medical R&D for human’s quality of life (QOL)

AMED is financed by three Japanese Government Ministries with a total budget of US$ 1.4 billion in FY2015.

• METI
• MEXT
• MHLW

AMED not only offers budgets, but also officers and scientists with new mindsets.

In a way AMED corresponds to the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle:

Amino acids / glucose / lipids correspond to the METI / MEXT / MHLW Ministries.

AMED catalyzes these 3 different substrates to galvanize medical R&D processes.

Brain/MINDS (Brain Mapping by Integrated Neurotechnologies for Disease Studies) project

Purpose of the Brain Mapping by Integrated Neurotechnologies for Disease Studies (Brain/MINDS) project is to map a primate brain to help understand brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease and schizophrenia. For an overview see:

• Marmosets are stars of Japan’s ambitious brain project by David Cyranoski, Nature 514, 151–152 (09 October 2014) doi:10.1038/514151a
• home page of the Brain/MINDS program http://brainminds.jp/

Overcoming balkanization: patients’ needs vs physicians’ desire (e.g. to publish papers)

We need to overcome balkanization, and share ideas and data, e.g. we need to overcome the conflicts of interests between patients’ needs and the desire of physicians for example to publish scientific papers. We need to overcome balkanization of sequencers vs physicians, scientists vs bureaucrats, universities vs industry, and especially bureaucrats vs. bureaucrats (e.g. from a different Ministry) etc.

AMED: How to reform medical R&D systems?

• make “inflexible and balkanized funding” flexible and unified
• promote global alliances to facilitate data sharing
• support ARO network in University Hospitals for activating clinical research
• optimize peer-review in pilot projects: online in English (partly from FY2016), 5 all-English programs, database of all accepted proposals
• overcome “ECG budgets” and promote PPP
• social implementation of genomic medicine

Initiative on Rare and Undiagnosed Diseases (IRUD)

Homepage of AMED’s Initiative on Rare and Undiagnosed Diseases (IRUD):

• English: http://www.amed.go.jp/en/program/IRUD/
• Japanese: http://www.amed.go.jp/program/IRUD/

see also:

• “Orphan: The Quest to Save Children with Rare Genetic Disorders” by Philip R. Reilly, see: http://www.orphanthebook.org
• “The Emperor of All Maladies. A biography of cancer.” by Siddhartha Mukherjee (The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer is a book written by Siddhartha Mukherjee, an Indian-born American physician and oncologist. Published on 16 November 2010 by Scribner, it won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction: the jury called it “an elegant inquiry, at once clinical and personal”). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor_of_All_Maladies, https://openlibrary.org/works/OL15686144W/Emperor_of_All_Maladies

Our aim is to overcome the “N-of-1 problem” by data sharing, i.e. we work to find patients with similar rare and undiagnosed diseases.

Why did we start from IRUD?

We want to improve 3 different types of life: life science, diary life and quality of life of patients and family.

We want to stop “research for budgets”, and empower “budgets for research”.

We want to encourage global data sharing, and overcome researcher’s inner biological behavior.

We want to overcome fragmentization of budgets and of expensive machines.

We want to overcome the phenomenon of “Darth Vader-type Professors”.

Data sharing not only for diagnosis, but also for drug discovery.

We respect front-line physicians who help patents who suffer from “diagnostic odyssey”, who are sent from test to test without hearing a valid diagnosis or treatment.

Our IRUD Regional Alliance includes 200 hospitals in Japan. We have more than 2000 registered families, and our program is showing first results with case matches of patients with similar rare diseases with foreign countries.

Tohoku Medical Megabank Organization (ToMMO)

Tohoku Medical Megabank Organization (ToMMO) at Tohoku University provides high quality genome variant data as an open resource: http://www.megabank.tohoku.ac.jp/

On 11 January 2016 we concluded a Memorandum of Cooperation between NIH and AMED.

SCRUM-Japan

SCRUM-Japan is a nation-wide, multi-centric cancer genome screening program with headquarters at the National Cancer Center in Kashiwa: http://epoc.ncc.go.jp/scrum/.
SCRUM-Japan is a successful academia-industry cooperation program encouraging data sharing among pharmaceutical sectors. Many major pharmaceutical companies cooperate.

National Clinical Database

The National Clinical Database includes more than 95% of operation data of general surgery in Japan: http://www.ncd.or.jp/

AMED supports the application of the National Clinical Database (NCD) to post-market surveillance of medical devices.

Real World Data (SSMIX 1+2) – Science Information NETwork 5 (SINET5)

Science Information NETwork5 (SINET5)

AMED will start investments from April FY2017

Data sharing in AMED: no trust – no sharing: no man is an island.

• IRUD & SCRUM-J, using ToMMo with more than 4000 Japanese variants
• NCD extension to clinical research
• Clinical genomics data base (from FY2016): rare diseases, cancer, infectious diseases, dementia
• Central IRB projects

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Growth and innovation at Mitsui Chemicals

Minoru Koshibe

keynote talk given at 9th Ludwig Boltzmann Forum, Embassy of Austria in Tokyo, 16 March 2017

Minoru Koshibe, Mitsui Chemicals, Executive Vice-President, health care business sector and other business sectors

Summary written by Gerhard Fasol

Minoru Koshibe – Profile

Minoru Koshibe majored in protein crystallography with a Master’s Degree. He started work at a predecessor company in 1978, worked in processor engineering, and later in head quarters in corporate planning.
Mitsui Chemicals was established by merger in 1997. Minoru Koshibe in 2003 joined the fine chemicals division, was involved in the Sankyo Agro acquisition, in the establishment of subsidiaries/affiliates (JPS, HMCI, OPC, YK, JC and others), and in M&A (Acumen, KOC, Hereaus Kulzer)
Minoru Koshibe worked 17 years in manufacturing, basic chemicals, R&D, construction and production,
9 years in the function chemicals business sector, and
12 years in corporate planning, and business planning.

About the Mitsui Chemicals Group

Our corporate mission is:

Contribute broadly to society by providing high-quality products and services to customers through innovation and the creation of materials, while keeping in harmony with the global environment

And our corporate target is:

Constantly pursuing innovation and growth to become a chemical group with an undisputed global presence

• Founded: 01 October 1997 by merger, however Omuta Works started operation in 1912, so including predecessor companies Mitsui Chemicals has over 100 years history
• Paid in capital: YEN 125 billion
• Subsidiaries and affiliates: 133 (55 in Japan, 17 in the Americas, 20 in Europe, 16 in China, 7 in Singapore, and 18 elsewhere
• Employees: 13,600 (9,300 in Japan, 1,350 in the Americas, 1,100 in Europe, 800 in China, and 1,050 elsewhere

Business Segments

• Mobility (26%): PP compounds, elastomers, performance polymers, electrolytes
• Healthcare (13%): vision care, nonwovens, dental, amino acids
• Food and Packaging (16%): packaging films, protection films, agrochemicals, hybrid rice
• Basic materials (45%): gas pipes, bi-phenol, methyl methacrylate, PET resins, polyurethane

Origins and history of the Mitsui Chemicals Group:

• 1912. Contribute to solving food shortages caused by rapid population growth: manufacture raw materials for fertilizers from exhaust gas, a byproduct of coal business
• 1932. Contribute to preserve our indigo culture: achieve Japan’s first successful production of indigo dye by using chemical technology
• 1958. Contribute to industrial modernization. Construct Japan’s first petrochemical complex.

MCI 2025 Basic Strategies

• Pursue innovation
• Accelerate global expansion
• Strengthen competitiveness of existing businesses

Strategy for our Healthcare Domain

FY2016: Operating income = YEN 15 billion
FY2025: Operating income = YEN 45 billion + new business

Creation of new products

• vision: functional ophthalmic lens line-up
• hygiene: new functional nonwovens
• personal: new products for detergent and cosmetics
• oral: 3D printers and laser milling machines

Strengthen existing businesses

• vision: sales activities in North America, China and India
• hygiene: high functional nonwovens
• personal: licensing business
• oral: periodontal disease treatment drugs, IoT and network solution business, denture and OSA mouthpiece business in North America

New business

• vision: electronic glasses (see in the photographs below: Mr Minoru Koshibe was wearing prototype electronic glasses during the keynote lecture)
• personal: surgical materials, physical mobility
• oral: new domains of dental materials

Globalization

• hygiene: specialized products
• oral: dental business in India, ASEAN, Middle East and Eastern-Europe, dentures and OSA mouthpieces in Europe and Asia

Strategy for our healthcare domain: fusion of materials and IT, realization of personalized healthcare, open innovation

Super Aging Society is coming soon

As regenerative medicine technology advances, life expectancy might increase to 100 years age by the year 2050

Japan’s population has peaked around 125 million around 2010, and may decrease to around 50 million by 2100

When asked for their biggest regret in life, 70% of old people answer: Not to have taken on challenges:
Lets live to accomplish your purpose!
Lets make a meaningful life!

Lets change our thinking about aging: instead of seeing old age as a decrease in value, lets see old age as seniority, as increasing value through knowledge, challenges and experience!

Concern about Japanese Conglomerates

Over the last 20 years the “earning power” of Japanese companies decreased compared with other major countries.

Market capitalization (corporate value) of Japanese corporations is falling behind compared to both Western countries and emerging countries:

The stock index FY2016 / FY1990:

• Japan = 0.7
• USA = 7
• Germany = 7
• India = 24
• China = 24
• Indonesia = 12

thus while the stock index has grown 7 times both in Germany and USA, and grown 24 times in India and China, it has actually fallen by 30% in Japan.

Market capitalization FY2015 / FY1990:

• Japan = 1.7
• USA = 8.1
• Germany = 4.8
• India = 5.4
• China = 16
• Indonesia = 5.3

while the market capitalization has grown 8.1 times in USA, 4.8 times in Germany, and grown 5.4 times in India and 16 times in China, it has only grown 1.7 times in Japan.

Capital markets are actually highly complex systems including the markets (stock exchanges) investors, intermediaries, are influenced by disclosures and governance rules. We need to improve the system as a whole, as well as its parts, to improve the performance of Japanese corporations.

Epilogue

In the past technology was made for people, e.g. airplanes and jets. In future more and more products will be made for robots, drones and other machines. Where is the place for people in such a world?

Lets build a society where technology (robots) and people can coexist!

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Innovation – A style in Japan

Yayoi Kamimura

keynote talk given at 9th Ludwig Boltzmann Forum, Embassy of Austria in Tokyo, 16 March 2017

by Yayoi Kamimura INTEL, Global Account Executive, previously: NTT Docomo, Director and Head of Business Development & Investment

Summary written by Gerhard Fasol

Yayoi Kamimura – self introduction

• 20 years experience in open innovation, services alliance and JV with foreign companies
• originally investment banker
• promote innovation to customers with cutting edge Silicon Valley technology
• Joint ventures and investments: PLDT, Sri Lanka Telecom, StarHub, Codelco, TT&T
• Service alliances and collaborations: runtastic for docomo, Toyota, M-TV, SEGA
• Anti-Fraud App: “hi its me” fraud crime exceeds US$ 400 million/year in Japan. Recently launched anti-mobile fraud app to protect the elderly population from these types of crime. The system monitors suspicious in-coming calls to the elderly, then sends alerts to their family

Snap shots: Macro view on Japan’s innovation landscape

R&D and patent applications

2016 R&D expenditure vs GDP

1. USA: GDP (PPP) = US$ 18,559 Bill, R&D 2.77% of GDP
2. China: GDP (PPP) = US$ 20,015 Bill, R&D 1.98% of GDP
3. Japan: GDP (PPP) = US$ 4,913 Bill, R&D 3.39% of GDP
4. Germany: GDP (PPP) = US$ 3,741 Bill, R&D 2.92% of GDP

Patent applications by Chinese companies have been sky-rocketing since 2000, while patent applications by US, Korean and European companies are steadily increasing, patent applications by Japanese corporations have peaked around 2000, and have been decreasing ever since 2000.

Japan is trailing in R&D efficiency, defined as total value add in the last 4 years / total $ spent for R&D between 8-6 years ago:

While R&D efficiency in USA and Germany is similar between 80-90 times during the last 10 years, R&D efficiency in Japan has dropped from 80 times in the 1990s to near 60 times currently.

Venture Capital and start-ups

With only 3.7% of the population, Japan has one of the lowest ratios of entrepreneurs in the world.

In countries like Zambia, Nigeria or Ethiopia the entrepreneur population is on the order of 40% of the population.

In China, USA, Canada, the entrepreneur population is on the order of 12-14%.

In Japan the entrepreneur population is only 3.7% – similar to France, Belgium, Germany.

Venture Capital Funding is shockingly low in Japan

VC Funding 2016:

• USA: VC Funding US$ 60 billion
• China: VC Funding US$ 20 billion
• Japan: VC Funding US$ 2 billion

Start-up ecosystem

Japan does not appear in rankings of the “hottest start-up ecosystems” (source: Spark Labs Global Venture):

1. Silicon Valley
2. Stockholm
3. Tel Aviv
4. New York
5. Seoul
6. Boston
7. Los Angeles
8. Beijing
9. London
10. Berlin

Start-up ecosystems require:

1. startup culture
2. engineering talent
3. technology infrastructure
4. economic foundation
5. funding and exits
6. active monitoring
7. legal and policy infrastructure
8. government policy and programs

As a result of “Digital-Capital” mobile internet unicorns in Q1 2015, which include Facebook at the top, only three Japanese “unicorns” appear in the ranking: DeNA, GREE, and Cookpad.

USA has a large number of young companies, established since the 1970s with high market caps, e.g. Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon etc.

Japan has only one single such company: SoftBank.

What can we change today?

In the public domain we need changes:

• Education system, STEM: coding population, diversity, gender gap bridges
• Public sector R&D: DARPA like organization, TAX breaks
• Policy change: deregulation, promotion or open innovation, funds flow, capital markets
• Universities and research agencies: more funds, clear goal set and PDCA

In the private domain we need changes:

• Organization: double decker structure, CVC
• Management: vision and target setting, acquisition & development rather than R&D / not NIH, start-up inclusion
• Process: PDCA, SPEED, ROI monitoring
• People: talent, skilled labor, IP and Legal, Standardization
• Funds

We need entrepreneurs, especially those who can compete globally

We need many more coding population in face of the software defined economy, we need to rewrite our DNA

We need to expand the funds flow to startups, from public sector and from private capital markets

Conclusions

1. Japan is now facing big challenges and global competition to even keep the status quo in innovation
2. Both public and private level, we should rewrite our DNA and accelerate the rejuvenation our economy
3. Innovation happens where money is. We should be ready to invest in more riskier assets of start-ups, both on private and public level. And the money does flow where returns are sound
4. Build our ecosystems and gain the momentum to maximize innovation, producing next generations of Sony, Honda, Toyota… they were all ventures at their start
5. Large enterprises transform themselves and/or we welcome the rise of new generation entrepreneur players

Copyright (c) 2017 Eurotechnology Japan KK All Rights Reserved

Endeavors for Mathematics for Industry in Japan

Masato Wakayama

keynote talk given at 9th Ludwig Boltzmann Forum, Embassy of Austria in Tokyo, 16 March 2017

by Masato Wakayama Executive Vice-President & Trustee, Kyushu University, Distinguished Professor of Mathematics

(Summary of Professor Masato Wakayama’s talk written by Gerhard Fasol)

Two important energies: hydrogen energy and prime number energy

• Hydrogen drives the hydrogen economy
• Prime numbers are at the core of encryption, the RSA Cryptosystem

Prime number were discovered almost 2500 years ago by the Pythagorean school in ancient Greece: the infinitude of primes, and the unique prime decomposition of integers.

2017 and Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann (LEB)

2017 is prime in Z (the set of all integers), i.e. indecomposable.

However, Theorem:
2017 = |LEB|^2 in Z[i] where i = sqrt(-1), i.e. Gaussian integers

Proof of the Theorem:

2017 is a Pythagorean prime, 2017 = 9^2 + 44^2

LEB = 1844 = 18 + 44 = 9 x 2 + 44 = (twice 9) + 44 (mod 99)

twice 8 equals 9i. It follows that LEB = 9i + 44

Corollary:
LEB’s birth year decomposes the prime 2017, that is, LEB Symposium 2017 opens New Thoughts.

9i + 44, in Japanese can be pronounced as:

(44 + 9i) よし！行く！　which means: “Let’s go!”
(i9 + 44) 行くと良し　 which means: “Best to go.”

Manyo-Shuu Anthology （万葉集）

During Japan’s Manyo era, poets made puns based on multiplication tables.

Examples:
二二 = 2 x 2 = 4 = し
十六 = 16 = 4 x 4 = しし
八十一 = 81 = 9 x 9 = 九九
二五 = 2 x 5 = 10 = とを
etc

An example is:

『万葉集』巻十一（2542）
若草乃 新手枕乎 巻始而 夜哉将間 二八十一不在国
（若草の、新手枕を、巻き初めて、夜をや隔てむ、憎くあらなくに）
訳：若草のような妻とはじめて手枕をかわしそめて
どうして一夜でも間を置くことができようか
可愛くてしかたがないのに

“Manyo-shuu” Voll.11 (2542)
Ever since I started to sleep on the hand of
my new wife as a pillow, soft as young grass/
It is no longer possible to be separated from
her over night/ How could I, when there is not
a speck of hate in my heart

Historical background in Japan

1603 – 1868, Edo period, Samurai era

We had a peaceful period in Japan, and Japan was a closed country.

Takakazu Seki 関孝和 (1642 – 1708)

In 1674 discovered the determinant, earlier than the discovery by Leibniz in 1683.
He discovered Bernoulli numbers independently around the same time as Jacobi Bernoulli.

He discovered:
derivatives and integrals (in the West: Newton, Leibniz)
but, there was no discovery of the fundamental theorem of Calculus.
Mathematics votive tablets (san-gaku) featuring mathematical puzzles, mainly Euclidean Geometry.

1868 – 1912, Meiji Period, opening of Japan

Social system, law were imported from Britain
Science, technology were imported from Germany
Culture and arts were imported from France

In pure Mathematics, Göttingen in Germany was the leading center, and pure mathematics was imported from Göttingen to Japan

Applied mathematics was much harder to import to Japan.

1926 – 1989: Showa period, from 1989: Heisei period

Japan’s period of fast growth.

Japan had many strong applied mathematicians before high performance computers were developed in the mid-1990s, but they were not regarded or valued as mathematicians.

After the introduction of high performance computers, applied mathematics decreased in emphasis in Japan.

The Policy Study No. 12 of 2006 by NISTEP (of MEXT) created a shock for Japan’s mathematics community: the report wrote “Japanese mathematics is not as strong as we had expected”:

“Mathematics as deserted science in Japanese S&T policy” ― Current situation on mathematical sciences research in major countries and need for mathematical sciences from the science in Japan ―
May 2006
by: Moritaka Hosotsubo, Yuko Ito, Terutaka Kuwahara

The main reason for this weakness was found to be the weakness and decreasing numbers of applied mathematics, and applied mathematicians.

The report stated: “It is desirable to have the same percentage of workers in the private sector of research and development as the West, which is 65%. However, in Japan the percentage in the private sector is only 26%. This shortage and nearly 40% gap relative to the West must be overcome”

At the same time, there was a world-wide trend in favor of mathematics for industrial technologies:

• Institute for Math. Its Appl., Univ. of Minnesota (USA, 1982 – )
• Oxford Centre for Indust. Appl. Math. (OCIAM), (UK, 1989 – ), OCCAM (2008-)
• Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Mathematics ITWM (Germany, 2000- )
• European Consortium for Mathematics in Industry (ECMI) (1986 – )
• OECD/Global Science Forum “Reports on Mathematics in Industry” (2008,2009)
• MATHEON (Germany)
• MITACS (MPRIM, Canada)

As a consequence, MEXT commissioned an investigation project “Investigation and estimation of promotion of cooperation of mathematics and mathematical science with other fields – Toward a proposal for the 4th governmental science & technology master plan”
(October 2009 – March 2010)
Implementing organizations were:
Kyushu University (Main),
University of Tokyo,
Mathematical Society of Japan,
Nippon Steel Company.
And the representative was: Masato Wakayama (Kyushu University)

We investigated and estimated the activities of mathematics and mathematical science, and those of their cooperation with the other fields that have been implemented in Japan, and thereby gained ideas for making a proposal to the Japanese government for promoting mathematics and for strengthening cooperation with various fields surrounding mathematics.

As a consequence of this investigation project:

1. The 4th Governmental Science & Technology Basic Plan (2011) of the Prime Minister’s Council of Science and Technology Policy (CSTP) for the first time ever stated that Mathematical Sciences are important and should be promoted.
2. The Mathematics Innovation Unit was established in MEXT
3. The Committee of Innovation by and for Mathematics was established by the Committee of Science and Technology (2011)
4. MEXT organized 22 workshops in mathematics and 36 workshops in mathematical sciences and math-for-industry
5. Cooperations with Mathematics programs and several leading schools of mathematics

2016: The 5th Governmental Science and Technology master plan again emphasizes mathematical science

Some resulting research programs:

• Alliance for breakthrough between mathematics and sciences (ABMS), leader: Yasumasa Nishiura (WPI Advanced Institute for Materials Research, Tohoku University) JST CREST/PREST 2007-2016
• Modeling methods allied with modern mathematics, leader: Takashi Tsuboi (Graduate School of Mathematical Sciences, University of Tokyo) JST CREST 2014-
• Collaborative mathematics for real world issues, leader: Hiroshi Kobuku (Dept of Mathematics, Graduate School of Science, Kyoto Univ) JST PREST 2014-
• Meiji Institute for Advanced Study of Mathematical Sciences (MIMS), leader: Ichiro Hagiwara (Director Meiji University) 2007 –

The Institute of Mathematics for Industry (IMI) of Kyushu University

• April 1911: Kyushu University was founded as the 4th of 7 Imperial Universities
• June 1939: Dept of Mathematics founded
• June 1994: Graduate School of Mathematics and Faculty of Mathematics founded
• April 2007: Mathematical Research Center for Industrial Technology (MRIT) founded
• April 2008: Global COE Program “Education & Research Hub for Mathematics-for-Industry”
• April 2011: Institute of Mathematics for Industry (IMI) founded
• September 2014: IMI Australia Branch at La Trobe Univ. (Melbourne) founded

Some achievements of Kyushu University’s Institute of Mathematics for Industry (IMI) include:

• Long term internships from industrial partners
• Joint projects with industry: 29 projects with 22 companies
• Study groups at IMI, Study Group Workshops
• Forum Math-For-Industry: 2014, 2015, 2016
• Pacific Journal of Mathematics for Industry
• Mathematics for Industry

Study of Casimir effects

The Casimir effect (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casimir_effect) leads to attraction between opposite mirrors in a vacuum, which are spaced a short distance apart, due to electro-magnetic wave fluctuations in the vacuum. The Casimir effect was first predicted in 1948 by Hendrick Casimir (1909-2000), and first measured by Steve K. Lamoreaux 1996.

An equivalent effect exists between ships which are spaced close to each other, see: SL Boersma, “A maritime analogy of the Casimir effect,” Am. J. Phys. 64, 539–541 (1996), http://dx.doi.org/10.1119/1.18150.

Derivation of the Casimir effect shows that the force between the two plates is directly related to Riemann’s zeta function, which again is directly connected with prime numbers.

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