Microstructures are widely used in the manufacture of functional surfaces. By manipulation of the microgroove shape, we can design planar high-numerical-aperture lenses and reflectors, where the phase retardance effect of the designed structure is important. However, this complex phenomenon involves many parameters such as polarization and wavelength of illumination, period, filling factor, and depth of the structure. The phase retardance behavior of periodic microgroove structure is discussed based on FDTD analysis and analytical approaches.

In recent years, nano metal structures have been in the center of considerable attention due to their unique optical phenomenon and potential applications in the field of medical and optics. However, some disadvantages, including low efficiency, high cost and inconvenience, are still exist. To solve these problems, a method of nano structures fabrication was proposed, which utilizes evanescent wave to provide energy to make nanoparticles self-assembled into the structures. By changing the parameters which depend on evanescent wave and vibration in experiments, the nano metal particles can form into different structures, and the fabricated processes are less than the other method. With these characteristics, this method largely simplifies the fabricating process of nano metal structures and improve the processing efficiency.

Especially for large scale measurement using laser trackers, registration between measured 3D point cloud and reference (CAD) data is widely required. In this study, feature hole extraction using 3D point cloud segmentation was studied. Measurement device was set as a line scanner mounted on CMM of which integrated measurement range was about 1000 mm. We introduce the trial of automatic initial alignment using extracted features.

It is required to adjust the focus of the stereo camera using a conversion lens, to validate its performance with the monitor. The distortion given by the conversion lens may harm the distance measurement. In this study, the distortion is investigated using the constant colored random pattern parallax image, which is collected by inverse distortion function generated by the picture of the grid through conversion lens.

At the sugar factory, skillful inspectors perform the acceptance inspection of sugar beets. The inspection process is mainly performed visually. Due to labor shortage problem of recent years, automated inspection technologies for sugar beets have been required. In this paper, we report a development of evaluation techniques to determine a crown ratio of sugar beet by using fourier descriptors.

At sugar factories, evaluation of sugar beets is conducted visually by skillful inspectors at receipt stage. Due to labor shortage problem of recent years, automated evaluation technologies for sugar beets have been required. To solve this problem, we developed automated visual evaluation techniques for sugar beets by image processing. In this paper, we report a development of evaluation techniques to detect stone and corrupted sugar beets by using Mask R-CNN.

The hardness of cells has a strong correlation with diseases, and it is required to establish a method for measuring cell hardness. In this research, an end effector for a small robot arm was developed. Furthermore, I am aiming to develop a micromanipulator that can measure reaction force. A semiconductor strain gauge suitable for microforce measurement and a micromanipulator with a shape suitable for cell manipulation will be manufactured at the same time using MEMS technology. As a result, physical grip and reaction force measurement became possible.

Encapsulation of cells in calcium-alginate (Ca-alginate) hydrogels via droplet microfluidics has been popular for diverse biological applications. However, a limitation of a microfluidic droplet generator (MFDG) is its low throughput. Here, we propose a novel microfluidic platform to achieve the mass production of monodisperse Ca-alginate microgels encapsulating mammal cells. The microfluidic module consists of two distinct compartments: a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) microchip containing 16-128 paralleled rectangular microgrooves, and a cubic stainless-steel supporting module having four slits from which corn oil as a continuous phase, an aqueous sodium alginate solution as a disperse phase, and a water-in-oil emulsion phase containing calcium chloride solution are evenly supplied into the parallel and confined microchannels. We produced Ca-alginate hydrogel particles with diameters of 83 µm with a coefficient of variation around 5% at a maximum production rate of 406 s^-1.

Step emulsification is one of the widely used microfluidic methods for droplet generation. However, as is the case with the shear-induced droplet generation method, this method faces the challenge of the low monodispersity caused by the satellite droplets. Meanwhile, deterministic lateral displacement (DLD), a passive microfluidic separation method, has been attracting a considerable attension recently, because it can separate particles based on their sizes easily. In this study, we have demonstrated generation and separation of 1,6-hexanediol diacrylate (HDDA) droplets using a microfluidic device comprised of arrayed micronozzles for step emulsification and micropillar arrays for DLD separation on a chip. The HDDA containning 1% photo initiator (DAROCUR 1173) and 2 wt% aqueous polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) solution were used as the disperse phase and the continuous phase, respectively. The D_c of the device, which is the separation boundary, was set at 27.8 um.The main and satellite HDDA droplets were generated at the edge near the micronozzles. Then, after flowing into the DLD micropillar array, the main droplets (diameter, 47 um) flowed at a small angle towards the sidewall (displacement mode), while the satellite droplets (diameter, < 5 um) migrated along the flow direction (zigzag mode).

We develop an alignment monitor which can detect fluctuations of micrometer in a severe environment of high magnetic field and vacuum for a term longer than several months. It consists of a 3-dimensional measurement grid of multiple optical fiber introduced absolute distance interferometers based on an optical frequency comb. Here, we evaluate a prototype of a ball lens module, which configures the measurement paths of the interferometers.

It is difficult to create wiring with low resistance, high elasticity, and high durability, and there are few practical examples of clothing with wiring on cloth. In this study, we implemented wiring on cloth with low resistance using copper foil, and clarified the conditions for creating such wiring.