International Workshop:
Frontiers of Quantum Physics

To all participants, in particular professors who spent a great deal of time flying from overseas: I would sincerely like to show my deep gratitude to all of you for attending and giving lectures on behalf of the organization and advisory committees. I am very pleased to note that this International Workshop ``Frontiers of Quantum Physics'' is fully supported by a kind of special grant called a ``Grant in Aid from Scientific Research on Priority Areas No. 763'' from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) of Japan. The title of the grant is ``Dynamics of String and Field Theories'', which is the same as that of the workshop. However, in this workshop, we have extended the scope to include anything fitting the title. In fact, the program includes not only superstring theory and field theory themselves, but also information theories, and biophysics topics, such as DNA, since we believe such new subjects may well be those in field theories in the 21st Century.

The subject of our priority area corresponds to research of a wide range of dynamical properties of quantum field theory and superstring theory, which are truly the basis of present elementary particle physics. The contents of the studies are 1) dynamics of quantum gravity and construction of unified theory through superstring theory, 2) foundations of quantum field theory and its application to broad areas from pure mathematics to material science, 3) weak-electromagnetic unified theory and phenomenological research and basic research of the standard model, weak-electromagnetic-strong interactions. Furthermore, applications to cosmology, the theory of the standard model, superstring theory and various models of elementary particle physics are included.

These research subjects may appear to be a collection of various different ones. However, these are indeed unified and universal investigations that clarify the dynamics of quantum field theory and superstring theory. In the 20th Century, physics developed in such a manner that one discovery in a research area stimulated quantum field theory and superstring theory. In this manner, new discoveries were induced among various fields that superficially appear to be very different. We may well say that the process of scientific development of the 20th Century occurred repeatedly. Science developments in this manner will be further accelerated in the 21st Century, and this development will focus to create and construct a new science.

In general, grants are very difficult to receive, and we were fortunate to receive ours. In our case, quite a few prominent physicists, such as Professor Hirotaka Sugawara, former President of the High Energy Accelerator Organization (KEK), Professor Toshihide Maskawa, former Director of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, Kyoto University, and Professor Makoto Kobayashi, former Director of the Institute for High Energy and Nuclear Physics, substantially support our proposal of for a grant.

This workshop was organized to a great extent by young particle physicists who made great efforts to organize it in such a short time. Finally, I would like to acknowledge, with deep gratitude, to Professor Taichiro Kugo, Director of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, Kyoto University, for his very kind arrangement to allow us to use the facilities of YITP and the hospitality extended to all participants.

Thank you all for your dedication again.

July 2006
Masao Ninomiya
Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, Kyoto University
and
The Leader of a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Priority Areas
(No. 763, September 2003 - March 2008).

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

It is my great pleasure to give a welcome greeting to open this international workshop, ``Frontiers of Quantum Physics''. On behalf of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, I would like to express my cordial welcome to all of you, in particular, to the participants who came from abroad.

As was explained by Professor Ninomiya just now, this workshop is hosted by the Okayama Institute for Quantum Physics and financially supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Priority Areas with the title ``Dynamics of Superstring and Field Theories'', the representatives of which are Professors Ninomiya and Kawai.

I am very happy that the Yukawa Institute can participate in this rather unique international workshop, which covers a variety of subjects in a very wide range of fields, for instance, quantum teleportation, quantum information and even the quantum theory of DNA. It is really very suitable that this type of workshop is held in this Yukawa Institute, since this institute has always emphasized interdisciplinary fields and pioneering new fields for the past half century. I hope this will be a successful workshop.

I should add an important comment. The main purpose of this workshop is, of course, of a scientific nature. But another purpose is to celebrate the opening of the Okayama Institute for Quantum Physics, as explained by Professor Ninomiya. Actually, this new institute was founded quite recently through the great efforts of Professor Ninomiya and others.

I would now like to propose to add yet another purpose for this workshop, that is to celebrate Ninomiya-san's 60th birthday. Actually, he was born on July 17th, 1944. So, precisely speaking, the 60th year was the last year. But it is not too late now, because this is still the same academic year in Japan. So it would be suitable, in particular, to dedicate the banquet of this workshop to the celebration of his 60th birthday. I hope this idea is supported by everyone (applause by audience). Thank you. The presentation of the details of Ninomiya-san's academic history will be postponed to the banquet.

I conclude my address by wishing to all of you a very fruitful meeting and a happy and enjoyable stay in Kyoto.

Thank you.

Taichiro Kugo
Director of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, Kyoto University

This conference has shown once again the beauty of quantum physics. For the first time I participated in a conference which covered such a broad scope of topics in this area.

This conference has allowed us to get a good idea of the spectrum of interests of theoretical physics in Japan, and of high energy physics in particular. First of all, expressing the common feeling of the foreign participants, let me thank the organizers, especially Sugino-san, Kawai-san and Ninomiya-san, for the possibility to participate in such an interesting event.

Let us again wish happy birthday to Masao Ninomiya and also congratulate him on his new appointment. Not many get such a beautiful present as an institute on their 60th birthday (laughing). Of course, I wish a great success and new scientific discoveries for the Okayama Institute for Quantum Physics.

I believe this conference sets the stage for quantum physics at the new institute and shows how diverse and interesting it could be. This conference was not only an interesting confrontation of ideas and various points of views of physics but also a certain confrontation of generations, which I consider a very useful thing. Perhaps, the young researchers will start understanding only later that the older scientists were on many occasions right. It is sometimes a very useful experience to try to put yourself for an instant outside of your own point of view.

Actually, one of the interesting confrontations in this conference was discussion of the question of whether theoretical physics should be first of all beautiful, or if the priority should rather be given to usefulness for explaining nature. Sometimes it seems that these two points, beauty and usefulness, are far from each other. I believe that everyone should create his or her own blend of these viewpoints in order to get the most efficient insight into physical reality.

But I think that it is difficult to convince young people not to do beautiful physics because, first of all, they like beautiful things, dramatically beautiful things. But before they will understand beautiful things, they should be more realistic and create some good robust work.

I do not have the time to review every talk of this conference. Among the subjects I was happy to hear about was holography, which I did not know very much about. This was a great opportunity for me. Also, I saw what a lively science is modern cosmology, and that it is very well represented in Japan. I really felt that if one wants to be permanently confronted with real experiments, it is a very good field to be in. This is really a very exciting scientific adventure, since one has, and one will have, so many experiments and observations. I also learned here a great deal about such different things as quantum strings and DNA structure.

The broad scope of this conference made it an interesting experience, which is worth repeating in the future.

Let me thank you again for inviting me here, and I hope that our cooperation will continue.

Vladimir Kazakov
Professor of Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris, France