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Part Promotion of Scientific Research

Although research in mechanical engineering, civil engineering, architecture, naval architecture, and aeronautical engineering have their respective research subjects and research techniques, they are alike in that their objects of research are respectively characteristic in form, and they center around functionality. For this reason, these engineering fields are discussed collectively under the heading of "Structural and Functional Engineering".

It can be said that most areas of engineering emerged in relation to areas of techniques which had already been established. In structural and functional engineering, the relevant techniques, or in more concrete terms the target products, are specified such as the house, bridge, ship, airplane, and so forth. These products are the artificial manifestations of human aspirations to live, to move, to fly, and so on. Around these products technical areas developed independently from each other. The academic discipline of engineering was developed later for the purpose of systematically organizing the knowledge accumulated in the respective technical areas, in a teachable form in order to help improve research efficiency. As a result, engineering is always open to the creation of new areas.

However, this concept of engineering based on human values which provides the basis for an open door character, produced a situation in which a system of knowledge in each specific area of engineering developed independently without deeply inquiring into the relationship between the areas. While researchers are interested in the mechanical functions of the research object, they care nothing of its electrical functions. This means that mechanical engineering which describes mechanical functions systematically exists independently of electrical engineering. If the engineering sciences, which have been founded in correspondence to man's specific aspirations. are to be called "area engineering", each "area engineering" has a tendency of isolating itself from others.

However, among various areas of structural and functional engineering, construction areas as well as shipbuilding and airplane areas, were unable to solve their respective practical problems without asking for help from other engineering areas. Therefore, these areas have depended on the mixed application of theories and techniques of other fundamental areas, related to mechanical, electrical, materials, and chemical engineering. In fact, It has been gradually recognized that this type of mixed application constitutes a characteristic feature common to all engineering fields, not confined to the areas of construction, shipbuilding and airplanes. In the structural and functional engineering areas, mixed application is given much more weight than in other engineering areas.

One of the recent research tendencies in structural and functional engineering is seen in the advancement of computational mechanics. The scientific systems, traditionally formed in the so-called structural areas, including structural mechanics (e.g., strength of materials, theory of elasticity, theory of oscillation, etc.), hydrodynamics, thermodynamics, and so on. In addition to these, the introduction of high-speed computation has resulted in the appearance of computational mechanics. Secondly, a new method for analyzing the properties of materials has been established through the help of the computer. Problems relating to fatigue, breakdown, wear, and other changes within the material as well as their actual processing were conventionally dealt with by phenomenological empirical values. Now, a method for more precisely analyzing phenomena and estimating changes is being established, by means of a more basic material value and by approaching the structural elements at the microscopic level. The third research trend is the tendency towards intelligence- and information-oriented research. With a view to providing machines and structures with "softer" and more complex functions, intelligence- and information-oriented research has become popular. Recent research is characterized by the expansion and advancement of controlling functions. In the aspect of expansion, research is conducted in the control of forms and properties by heat and exterior forces. Advancement in this research calls for further improvement of controllability through the introduction of information processing systems in which new computer-aided techniques, such as artificial intelligence, fuzzy control, fractal theory, etc. are utilized for the management of control signals. It is also expected that, in this engineering field, an entirely new field to be called mechatronics will possibly be created through the fusion of different fields.

As for research trends of the future, the development of computational mechanics, the development of intelligent robotics and other intelligent machines, as well as the advancement of basic research traversing many fields, such as reliability engineering, maintainability engineering, design engineering, manufacturing engineering and tribology, will be further promoted. As for the expansion of applied research, structural and functional engineering areas will play increasingly important roles in the development of space structures, marine structures, environmental measuring and controlling apparatus and so on. All of these are relevant to resource and environmental problems. Also in response to changes in social conditions, requests are being made for revolutionary systems and machines which extend beyond conventional engineering systems, for example, "soft machines" represented by home robots, and smaller machines such as micromachines. The importance of basic research will be further emphasized in order to cope with the expansion of applied research fields.