The fall of the Berlin Wall remains vivid in our memories, and we still remember our expectations at the time for the realization of world peace. And yet, our hopes were totally let down during this turbulent time. As we witnessed the collapse of the wall, we also anticipated that all mankind would be able to join together and face the growing global environmental challenges. With this increasing momentum, the Earth Summit was held in Rio de Janeiro three years after the historical event. This led us to share the concept of sustainable development as well as the need to solve poverty. In time, we have undertaken a process towards human solidarity aiming to realize the concept.

However, we started to recognise that the hope was premature. The international world order has fallen into a state of confusion which we have never experienced in our history. This chaotic situation must be resolved at the earliest possible moment. The question is how we as researchers of science and technology can contribute to the resolution of this problem.

The utilization of science and technology to counter terrorism has been raised as an urgent issue at some academies in the world. The most pressing goal for Japan should be to minimize the suffering of civilians caused by terrorist attacks. All the scientists in Japan, irrespective of differing viewpoints, must recognize their responsibility to achieve this goal.

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Besides this urgent and essential mission, we must define our long-term goal even in the midst of the turmoil. I believe this goal is the “expansion of the concept of sustainable development”. Our development activities are tolerated only on the condition that the opportunities to fulfill human needs are equally guaranteed to the future and present generations. In short, the concept of development originally involves a relationship between the present and future generations. However, by applying this condition to equality among people today, the scope of this concept would be expanded further. In other words, the development in any area of the globe should not reduce the people’s opportunities of those of other areas.

This principle should be a fundamental condition of the original concept of sustainable development. In fact, the Kyoto Protocol for preventing global warming was actually adopted according to this concept. Nevertheless, there are still many problems remaining, which require "expansion" or reconsideration on the meaning of sustainability. It can be considered that these problems are the underlying cause for the present breakdown of the order.

The challenges we are facing include the stable supply of food and clean water, treatment and prevention of diseases, securing of energy supplies and efficient utilization of resource. It is doubtful that there are universal perceptions and solidarity among us today to deal with such vital issues. Unfortunately it seems that we have no reliable vision or action plan towards the resolution of these issues.

Among them, however, the fight against global warming seems to be very promising despite the numerous problems lying ahead. Each country plays a role in this effort based on the commonly shared prospects within the framework centered on the United Nations.

Scientists will find a significant meaning in this international cooperation on the problems of climate change including ozone depletion. That is, such international consensus has been reached on the basis of scientific knowledge. The importance of the consensus was that

It was not simply the application of conventional subject-specific research achievements, but the application of innovative knowledge stemming from a new realm of research and obtained by multidisciplinary cooperation. This observation offers a profound "suggestion" for the roles and responsibilities of scientists as well as the future direction of researches in science and technology.

The immediate task at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) is to respond to this suggestion through the research activities. Since the inauguration of AIST, we have been seeking measures to meet the expectations of people and return benefits to society through useful research achievements. The research efforts at AIST include not only “Type-I" Basic Research”, but also “Type-II" Basic Research” that combine scientific knowledge and add innovative knowledge, leading to product development that will be meaningful and beneficial to society. “Full Research”, which comprehensively covers all these research aspects, is the basic principle of AIST activities, and each research unit is established and managed based on this principle.

The idea of “Full Research” comes from the philosophy that scientists must have an implicit “contract with society”. I believe that this concept is now commonly shared by scientists and accepted by the public through AIST’s workshops, ‘Type-II" Basic Research Workshop’ and ‘Product Workshop based on Full Research’, held during the past two years. We have succeeded in forming a link connecting AIST and industry to execute our “social contract”. The next step is to determine the most critical issue to tackle.

I consider that AIST’s mission is to deal with the issues involving the said hitherto untouched problems. In other words, we must clarify what to resolve through our “Full Research” for that goal. It is obvious that the resolutions of these global problems require society-wide action, but the linkage between AIST and industry must assume an integral part.