A press conference to announce the award from the Japan Agency for Medical Research, Research on Development of New Medical Devices, was held at 2:00 pm on April 8th, 2015, at the Shinshu University Matsumoto Campus Asahi Life Science Research Building. Representative investigator was Director of the Institute for Biomedical Sciences Dr. Naoto Saito. The study is a collaborative effort of Shinshu University, Teijin Nakashima Medical Co., Ltd., Okayama University, Fukuoka University, and Nihon Pharmaceutical University. It will run for 3 years starting April 1st, 2015, with a budget of 187.2 million yen, or 62.4 million yen annually.

Led by Shinshu University and Teijin Nakashima Medical Co., Ltd., the research team began its collaborative efforts in 2007. The group has improved the performance of polyethylene sockets by incorporating carbon nanotubes and has published studies on safety evaluations. Their current focus is on the practical use of artificial joints that use this new polyethylene socket. The group aims to prolong the lifetime of the prosthesis to enable the increasing number of joint disease patients in Japan’s aging society greater access to artificial joint replacement procedures.

Present at the conference were Shinshu University’s Director of the Institute for Biomedical Sciences Dr. Naoto Saito, Vice-president and Trustee of the research Dr. Mitsuo Takeda, and Vice-president and Dean of the Interdisciplinary Cluster for Cutting Edge Research Dr. Kunihiro Hamada.