4D Printing Summit 2025

What is 4D Printing Summit 2025?

Researchers and companies in Japan and overseas have reported many functional polymers that change their shapes and express functions in response to stimuli such as temperature, light, pH, magnetic fields, and force. 4D printing technology is attracting attention in Japan and overseas as a technology for combining such functional resins to create parts whose functions can be controlled by external stimuli other than electricity. 4D printing technology has been attracting attention in Japan and abroad as a technology to create parts whose functions can be controlled by external stimuli other than electricity. Just as 3D printers, which developed from optical fabrication technology, have spread to various fields such as the automobile, aviation, and medical industries, 4D printing technology is expected to develop in a variety of fields. We are currently at the stage where researchers and engineers from various fields, as well as people with issues in the field, are gathering to discuss and validate the ideas that emerge.

In this meeting, we will not only share the forefront of 4D printing research in Japan and abroad, but also provide an overview of 4D printing technology, from research on stimulus-responsive resins, which is important in determining the properties of parts and other materials, to simulations necessary to study printing methods with backcasting, from controlling the shape sought. We will then discuss what applications are possible and how to create the next step forward.

Schedule

Tuesday, July 29, 2025

Venue

Takanawa Gateway City
6F THE LINKPILLAR1 NORTH, 2-21-1 Takanawa, Minato-ku, Tokyo

Speakers

• 

  Hidemitsu Furukawa
  • Yamagata University Professor, Soft and Wet Matter Engineering Laboratory
  He is the laboratory head of the Soft and Wet Matter Engineering Laboratory (SWEL) at Yamagata University. He has been leading research on 3D printers in Japan, and in April 2018, he established the Yawaraka 3D Co-Creation Consortium and became its chairman, and is also making efforts for social implementation of the technology. Recently, in addition to taking on the challenge of advanced initiatives related to food printers, he was selected for the first time for the "NEDO Leading Research Program / Leading Research Program for Innovative Technology in Materials and Biotechnology" and is accelerating research in the materials field and 4D printers through an industry-academia collaboration system, aiming to create new industries.

• 

  Yoshiko Miura
  • Department of Chemical Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Kyushu University Professor, Graduate School of Agricultural Science
  D. in Engineering from Kyoto University in 2000, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, an assistant at Nagoya University, and an associate professor at Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) before becoming a professor at Kyushu University in 2010.
  His specialties include polymer chemistry, functional polymers, and biomimetic polymers, and he sees the potential for 3D printers to combine materials chemistry with molding processes.

• 

  Zhongyu Wang
  • Research Organization of Science and Technology, Ritsumeikan University associate professor
  D. in 2011 from the Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Ritsumeikan University. D. in Engineering. After working as an assistant at the Department of Robotics, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Ritsumeikan University, a specialist researcher at the Research Organization of Science and Technology, a visiting researcher at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich), and an assistant professor at the same university, he will be an associate professor at the Research Organization of Science and Technology in 2019 and an associate professor at the Department of Robotics, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Ritsumeikan University in 2022, Currently. Engaged in research on soft robotics and biomedical engineering. He received the Best Paper Award at the international conferences M2VIP2017, IEEE RCAR 2018, and UR2020, and the Best Presentation Award at the System Integration Division Lecture Meeting (SI2022) of the Society of Instrument and Control Engineers. He is a member of the Robotics Society of Japan, the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, the Japan Society of Biomedical Engineering, the Society of Nursing Science and Technology, and a senior member of the IEEE.

• 

  Takahashi Takayama
  • OUTSENCE Corporation President and CEO
  During his graduate school years, he joined JAXA laboratory to conduct research on large structures, but left because of the gap between research and feasibility. After engaging in private space development at ispace with the aspiration of social implementation, he established OUTSENSE Inc. in 2018. Ltd. in 2018. He is engaged in space decoration and product development based on design technology that applies origami structures. Currently, he is promoting research and development for the realization of space facility construction by developing three services based on origami engineering: [ODM], [R&D], and [SORIORI].

• 

  Katsuyuki Hara
  • Instalim Corporation Hardware Development Manager
  After working in mass production development at an automobile manufacturer, he started working on a new business of "3D printer x prosthetics" in 2018.In 2024, he joined Instalim Corporation, where he is engaged in the development of prosthetic feet using 3D printers. He is promoting the automation and standardization of prosthetic foot fabrication, which was previously done manually, mainly in emerging countries.

• 

  Hiroyuki Takahashi
  • Leave a Nest Co., Ltd. Director of Institute of Innovation and Knowledge
  Ph.D. from Yokohama City University in 2009. Ph.D. in Science, focusing on creating new research projects between industry and young researchers, including the launch of the " LNest Research Grant" for young researchers under the age of 40. He has also been involved in the creation of "super interdisciplinary academic societies," a place where individuals can combine their knowledge, skills, and passion for problem solving to create new knowledge without being bound by the framework of academia, and the establishment of real laboratories for knowledge manufacturing, among other activities to create seeds for research and development.

Schedule