Greetings from the Director of the National Defense Medical College Research Institute
(NDMCRI）
Defense medical research is applied medical research based on basic and clinical medicine conducted by the National Defense Medical College (NDMC) to ensure the safety, maintain the health, and enhance the strength and capability of the personnel who respond to various missions such as terrorism, large-scale disaster response, and infectious disease crisis management, as well as to defend Japan under the recent increasingly tense international security environment. Our NDMCRI is a centralized, rapid, and powerful organization to promote these studies.
NDMCRI was established in 1996, the year after the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake and the Sarin gas attack on the subway in 1995, to "conduct comprehensive research on lifesaving and emergency medicine for mass casualties in large-scale disasters. Initially, there were three divisions: the Division of Traumatology, the Division of Biomedical Engineering, the Division, and Abnormal Environmental Health Research Division. In 1997, the Division of Behavioral Science and the Division of Information Systems were added to the five-division structure. In 2012, an additional position of "Infectious Disease Epidemiology Analysis Officer" was established to protect the corps members from the threat of emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases at home and abroad. In 2016, the reorganization led to the establishment of the Division of Traumatology, the Division of Biomedical Engineering, the Divion of Environmental Medicine, the Division of Behavioral Science, the Division of Bioinformation and therapeutic system, the Division of Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Control.
In 2024, the Bioinformation Management Office was established to build a biobank of corps members and support advanced research and education using big data, and t the International Exchange Research Officer (currently recruiting) was created to promote international joint research in close cooperation with the U.S. military and other organizations.
The mission of the NDMCRI has the following four pillars

1. to promote defense medical research of high academic value and to disseminate the results of such research in cooperation with the various organizations of the research department, other universities, research institutes of other ministries and agencies, and companies, in order to advance the medical care of the Self-Defense Forces.
2. to collect and analyze the latest information on rapidly changing global trends in defense and military medicine, and to contribute to the formulation of policy and research strategies in the Self-Defense Forces medical field (think tank function)
3. to contribute to international security by strengthening research support and collaboration with U.S., NATO, ASEAN, and other militaries
4. to educate and train research leaders and improve the research environment to enhance the research capabilities of students and medical officers

In response to the recent major changes in defense and military medicine, the direction of defense medical research that we should promote should include not only conventional research on battle-related diseases, CBRNE attack response, life-saving blood transfusion system, health management under special environments, mental health, large-scale natural disaster response, threat analysis and field epidemiological studies of infectious diseases, etc., but also the rapidly advancing and changing military medical research. In addition, to respond to rapidly advancing and transforming military technologies (electronic warfare, directed energy weapons, AI weapons, cognitive warfare, etc.), it has become necessary to engage in physical energy bio-effects research and brain and cognitive science research.
We will take various opportunities to publicize and publish our research results from the viewpoint of fairness and transparency. We appreciate your understanding and cooperation.

April 1, 2024