Millimeter wave research activities in Japan

This paper is intended to give an insight into millimeter wave research activities in Japan particularly to participants from abroad. Quasigovernmental and academic organizations for promoting millimeter wave research and development are described. Then, state-of-the-art millimeter wave techniques such as MMICs, low cost production module techniques and MCM techniques are presented. The NRD-guide technology is also a topic to be discussed, since it has seen a new development toward practical applications. Though many millimeter wave applications systems have been proposed so far, indoor LANs and car collision avoidance radars seem to be near commercial availability. Another millimeter wave application technology is millimeter wave photonics which can be a key technology for millimeter wave mobile communications in the near future