Computer Science

This course explores research issues in the newly emerging field of mobile computing. Many traditional areas of computer science and computer engineering are impacted by the constraints and demands of mobility. Examples include network protocols, power management, user interfaces, file access, and security. 

This course emphasizes hands-on laboratory experience and teaches students research background, relevant theories, and basic laboratory techniques relevant to their field of study. Students formulate a research plan, implement it by conducting experiment-based research, and convey the results in scholarly presentations. Students submit a written research report at the end of the course.

The Individual Research Training Senior (IRT Senior) Course is an advanced course of the Individual Research Training B (IRT B) course in the Tohoku University Junior Year Program in English (JYPE) in the spring semester. Though short-term international exchange students are not degree candidates at Tohoku University, a similar experience is offered by special arrangement. Students are required to submit: an abstract concerning the results of their IRT Senior project, a paper (A4, 20-30 pages) on their research at the end of the exchange term, and an oral presentation on the results of their IRT Senior project near the end of the　term.

This is a special studies course involving an internship with a corporate, public, governmental, or private organization, arranged with the Study Center Director or Liaison Officer. Specific internships vary each term and are described on a special study project form for each student. A substantial paper or series of reports is required. Units vary depending on the contact hours and method of assessment. The internship may be taken during one or more terms but the units cannot exceed a total of 12.0 for the year.

This course provides a study of intellectual property rights and issues related to artificial intelligence including data technology and software. It covers legal and ethical issues related to artificial intelligence systems, software and big data utilization, etc.; intellectual property rights in AI related technology; fundamental principles and basic terms of intellectual property rights (e.g., patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, etc.) applicable to AI industry; the basics of technology transaction agreements including open source software license and other license agreements; and discusses various other social, ethical, legal and/or policy issues related to AI technology.

This course presents a conceptual and practical introduction to object-oriented programming and software engineering practices, exemplified by Java. As well as providing a grounding in the use of Java, the course will cover general principles of programming in imperative and object-oriented frameworks. Students learn to develop programs that support experimentation, simulation, and exploration in other parts of the Informatics curriculum (e.g. the capacity to implement, test, and observe a particular algorithm).

This course provides fundamental concepts in 3D modeling and animation. This course covers building or working with digital models, manipulating the models by means of computer deformation and animation, and using lighting and rendering techniques to create appealing scenes. Topics include coordinate spaces, transforms, 3D model representations, hierarchical structures, deformation, procedural modelling, particle systems, character animation, shading networks, lighting, and scripting concepts.

This course is an introduction to cognitive science. It provide a selective but representative overview of the subject, suitable for all interested students, including students on the cognitive science degrees and external students. The lecturing team presents a unified view of the field, based on a computational approach to analyzing cognition. The material is organized by cognitive function (e.g., language, vision), rather than by subdiscipline (e.g., psychology, neuroscience). The course covers language, vision, memory, control and action, and reasoning and generalization. All topics are presented from a computational point of view, and this perspective is reinforced by lab sessions in which students implement simple cognitive models.

This practical course offers an advanced study of programming skills and knowledge. It focuses on structured programming (with C) and object-oriented programming (with Java and Python). Assessment is based on developing two games: one in Java and the other in Python.

The course gives basic theoretical and practical knowledge about database systems and their organization. The emphasis is on relational databases. Topics include an introduction to database systems, basics of the relational model and the query language SQL, methods for data modelling and database design, E/R diagrams, and UML diagrams. Theory for the relational model: functional dependencies, normalization, relational algebra, stored procedures and triggers, and program and web interfaces to databases.  Previous knowledge with programming and Java  required.