ENGINEERING NEWS IN BRIEF

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                 ENGINEERING NEWS IN BRIEF
                       E-Mail Newsletter

                              No.5
            Issued by the Asian TOP Panel, May 2002.

          The Chinese Mechanical Engineering Society (CMES)
          The Institution of Engineers, Indonesia (PII)
          The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers (JSME)
          The Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers (KSME)

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About the Asian TOP Panel (ATOP)
   On August 29, 2001, presidents of four engineering societies gathered　
in Japan to pave the way for stepped-up collaboration. They are Chinese　
Mechanical Engineering Society, Institution of Engineers Indonesia,
Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, and Korean Society of Mechanical
Engineers.
   They agreed to establish the Asian TOP Panel (ATOP), which is a　
voluntary body and open to any Asian engineering society and
institution. At the first meeting, they decided to issue monthly E-mail　
newsletter which you are reading now. It will carry short technical news　
of Asian countries, and be distributed to all individual members of the
ATOP societies and institutions.
   ATOP will meet every two years. The next meeting will be held in Korea
in 2003.

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[Contents]

(1) Beijing Essen Welding 2002 (Source : CMES).
(2) Japan's Aichi Steel to Set up Auto Parts JV in China
   (Source : CMES).
(3) NOK Transferring More Parts Production to China (Source : CMES).
(4) Domestic Oil Shipper Sees Profits Rising (Source : CMES).
(5) A newly developed photonic crystal functional device.
　　- A nanohole array with ligh-emitting polymer - (Source : JSME).
(6) Bridges between Manufacturing Skills and Technology
   (Source : JSME).
(7) Micro Screw Pump to Discharge Effusion from Human Middle Ear
    (Source : JSME).
(8) Printing innovation -image-on-image color process using liquid toner-
　　(Source : JSME).
(9) Development of a New PCB Detoxifying Technology by Integrated
　　Physicochemical Treatment Biodegradation (Source : JSME).

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(1) Beijing Essen Welding 2002

Beijing Essen Welding 2002 is an internationally joint -sponsored event by
Chinese Mechanical Engineering Society, German Welding Society and Messe
Essen GmbH.
Through the efforts of organizers, the fair has become the third largest
welding show in the world and the largest one in Asia.
The 7th Beijing Essen Welding and Cutting Fair is to be held on November
5-8, 2002. Applications for space have been actively pouring in since early
this year. We welcome exhibitors old and new to join this very important
event. For more information, please contact: Ms. Xiaoying SU at
suxy@cmes.org or Fax: 0086-10-68533613.

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(2) Japan's Aichi Steel to Set up Auto Parts JV in China

Japan's Aichi Steel Corp today announced it will set up an auto parts joint
venture in Shanghai next month with three other firms.
The new company, named Shanghai Aichi Forging Co, will produce forged
automobile parts for China and Southeast Asian countries by taking over
Shanghai Automotive's existing factory there, Aichi Steel said, adding that
the new firm is set to begin operation in June.
The joint venture, with a capital of US$15 million, will be owned 42
percent by Aichi Steel,40 percent by China's Shanghai Automotive Forging
Works and 9percent each by Japanese trading firms Sumitomo Corp and Toyota
Tsusho Corp, according to Aichi Steel.
Aichi Steel and Toyota Tsusho are both affiliates of Toyota Motor Corp. It
expects to sell 10,000tons of products in its first year of operation and
gradually increase production to 27,000tons by 2006,Aichi Steel said.
Its clients will include Volkswagen AG, General Motors Corp and Toyota,
according to Aichi Steel.

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(3) NOK Transferring More Parts Production to China

NOK Corp. will shift some production of rubber vibration isolators from
Japan to China in a bid to lower costs to that it can meet demands from
automakers for cheaper prices.
It is the latest in a series of such moves by Japanese firms both inside
and outside the motor industry, giving ammunition to analysts who detect a
marked following out of Japan manufacturing base.
NOK has established a wholly owned manufacturing subsidiary in Wuxi,
Jiangsu Province, to open a Y1.7 billion (US$12.9 million) factory -its
fourth automotive facility in China - which will start production of
torsional dampers next April.
The annual turnover target is Y0.5 billion within in the first year out to
make up about 5% of NOK total revenue of for the product.

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(4) Domestic Oil Shipper Sees Profits Rising

China Shipping Development Co., the country's biggest oil shipper, said
2001 profit rose 15 percent after it bought tankers from its parent,
increasing its capacity by about two-fifths.
Net income rose to 325.3 million yuan ($39 million), or 0.11 yuan a share,
for the year through December from 282 million yuan, or 0.095 yuan in 2000.
Earnings were worse than the average 365 million yuan expected by four
analysts in a Bloomberg poll.
The company bought 20 tankers from its parent, China Shipping (Group) Co.
last June. Global shipping capacity, however, rose by 12 percent last year,
causing the average freight rate to fall by more than a fifth from 2000,
China Shipping said in a statement.
Sales rose 22 percent to 3.89 billion yuan. The company said it applied for
regulatory permission to sell 350 million new yuan- denominated shares to
raise 1.45 billion yuan. China Shipping first announced the share-sale plan
in April.
China Shipping, which handles more than four-fifths of China's domestic
coastal crude-oil shipments, said 25 percent- owned unit China Shipping
Container Lines Co. posted a loss of 280.8 million yuan, turning from a
profit of 2.76 million yuan.

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(5) A newly developed photonic crystal functional device.
　　- A nanohole array with ligh-emitting polymer -

Photonic crystal (PhC), which has refractive index contrast whose
periodicity is near the light wavelength, enable us to construct optical
integrated circuits with dimensions of around 100 mm2. One important issue
is how to introduce functionality into PhC optical circuits. Combinating
PhC with organic functional material could provide us a wide variety of
functions independently of the PhC structural material. Our first target
was to introduce a laser emission point into two-dimensional PhC. The PhC
was an alumina nanohole array consisting of closely packed hexagonal
ordered nanoholes with a diameter of around 200 nm, pitch of 300 nm, and
length of 20 mm. Positional selective drilling through a bottom of the
nanohole with a focused ion beam enables us to fabricate a through hole in
the nanohole array. Then, we introduced light-emitting polymer into the
through hole. The injected polymer acted as an emission point in the
alumina nanohole array PhC. This accomplishment provides a foothold for
PhC functional device fabrication.
(Atsushi Yokoo, NTT Basic Research Laboratories, yokoo@will.brl.ntt.co.jp)

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(6) Bridges between Manufacturing Skills and Technology

New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) has
started several research projects for IT-enhanced manufacturing. One of the
projects concentrates on the skills and knowledge in the dies and mold
industry, which is
the base of Japanese industries for developing competitive products. The
research project introduces a new approach to derive design and
manufacturing knowledge
from designers and engineers. The approach, named Active Knowledge Archive,
utilizes the virtual manufacturing technology to generate the
situations of problem-solving and to store the derived knowledge
information. This method enables us to realize context-oriented knowledge
description and utilization. The project tends to provide a method and
tools to small or medium die and mold companies for improving their
own knowledge and skills. In addition to this bottom-up approach, the
top-down approach of skill study has started at International Institute of
Advanced Studies (IIAS) in Kyoto, Japan. Kazuaki Iwata, IIAS Fellow,
intends to propose a research framework for scientific study of skills and
the list of important research subjects.
(Masahiko Onosato, Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University)

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(7) Micro Screw Pump to Discharge Effusion from Human Middle Ear

We developed a micro screw pump for discharging effusion from human
middle ear for treatment of otitis media. This tool extrudes effusion using
a twisted-wire type screw, which rotates at 1,500 1/s in a pipe penetrated
through human tympanic membrance.
The tool could clinically extrude high viscosity effusion within 20 seconds
even using a thin screw such as 0.5mm in diameter.
(Masayuki Nakao, The University of Tokyo)

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(8) Printing innovation －image-on-image color process using liquid toner－

    The image-on-image (IOI) color electrophotographic process using liquid
toner is one of break-through technologies to realize offset printing image
quality. In the IOI process, color images are superimposed on a single
photoreceptor drum and then transferred to the paper at once. Therefore,
our newly developed IOI process has many advantages for high image quality,
high speed with no fuser and low print cost for thin toner layer, which the
conventional processes using dry toner could not achieve. Utilizing these
features, the process is suitable for direct digital color proofing and
print-on-demand production printer.
(Kenichi Takahara，Research and Development Center, Toshiba Corporation)

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(9) Development of a New PCB Detoxifying Technology by Integrated
Physicochemical Treatment Biodegradation

    Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are widespread environmental
pollutants which are recalcitrant to biodegradation. After the effect of
PCBs on human health was reported, the manufacture and use of PCBs was
banned and large amounts were recovered and stored for subsequent
detoxification. In Japan, a standard of 0.003 mg/l (ppm) is demanded by law
as an acceptable cleanup of PCBs in effluents. We have successfully
developed a method which combines physicochemical treatment with biological
degradation for the complete degradation of concentrated PCBs. We examine a
pilot plant study on the degradation of PCBs from high voltage transformer.
After optimizing the culture conditions, we could eliminate over 99.9999%
of 100 g PCBs.(Kaneclor 1000) within 10 days. This degradation rate is
sufficient for the construction of an actual degradation process for PCBs.
To our knowledg, this is the first time that practical PCBs detoxifying
system has constructed with biological treatment.
(Toshio Hayakawa, Ph.D and Kazuhide Kimbara, Ph.D, Environmental
Biotechnology Lab., Railway Technical Research Institute)

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Editor: Kikuo Kishimoto, International Affairs Committee
Published by The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers
Shinanomachi-Rengakan Bldg, Shinanomachi 35,
Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 160-0016, Japan

FAX : 81-3-5360-3508
All Rights Reserved, Copyright C 2002
The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers
URL:http//www.jsme.or.jp [English Version]