LEHTSC2007

Abstract

LEHTSC2007 was held at AIST in Tsukuba, Japan, from 31 October to 3 November, and was attended by 110 scientists from twelve countries. In late October, the autumn leaves of the beautiful ginkgo trees change colour from verdant green to bright yellow, as always. For its part, the conference set out to search for the `Genome information', addressing the greatest unsolved mystery in current condensed matter physics, that is, the pairing mechanism of high temperature superconductivity (HTSC).Although there has been much effort and tremendous accumulated knowledge since the discovery of HTSC by Bednorz and Müller in 1986, we have failed to reach an unified view on the microscopic mechanism of HTSC. The fact that no mechanism has yet been accepted as an universal model may indicate that we may still be lacking `some important ingredients'. The search for the `missing ingredients' is now being accelerated as experimental techniques have improved to become state-of-the-art and overwhelmingly detailed information is readily attainable. Our attitude of cooperative communication is even more needed. Unfortunately, researchers with different ideas often tend to `phase-separate', and cross participation in scientific meetings is low. A complex phenomena like HTSC, often show different `shapes and colours' which can easily lead to misunderstanding if we narrow our view. This issue is expressed in the subtitle, `Spin, phonon, or the third way?' meaning that the `missing ingredients' (electron–lattice interaction) which has long been neglected must be properly taken into account to reach an understanding of the true mechanism. As Chairman of the Organizing Committee, I would like to express my greatest appreciation to all invited speakers, oral and poster contributors as their works confirmed that we are indeed taking the third way. In total there were 53 invited and contributed oral talks and 25 poster presentations. All lectures were followed by active comments and discussions. Starting from well-organized reviews of HTSC, the conference developed into detailed lectures. The atmosphere of the conference was open and casual so that everyone, including young scientists who will take on future responsibility, could have the opportunity to participate in constructive discussions. An interactive-mode voluntarymeeting was held before closing the last session which focused on important issues left for future discussions. The conference made us confident that our voyage will certainly continue in the future. In this conference, we took the open access policy. We recorded all talks in the conference as a multimedia, which will be open at the conference web site. The electronic proceeding (Journal of Physics: Conference Series) is an open access journal. By linking multimedia talks and electronic proceeding, scientific contents of LEHTSC2007 are accessible to all researchers around the world. We are optimistic that following conferences will be equally successful and contribute to shortening the time for the discovery of HTSC mechanism. Lastly, I would like to introduce some words from a philosopher that explains the process of finding the truth in the HTSC research. All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as self-evident. —Arthur Schopenhauer Acknowledgements We would like to express our greatest thanks to Kazunobu Tanaka in providing financial support for this conference. The efforts of the local organizing committee are appreciated which persisted for almost a year. Particular thanks are due to Misako Tsutsui for her outstanding work in website design and technical editing of the proceedings. AIST is thanked for the use of the conference rooms and related facilities. We appreciate backup support by The Physical Society of Japan and The Japan Society of Applied Physics. For multimedia recording, we wish to thank Media Site KK for their support and cooperation. We also appreciate exhibitors of Cryoportal 2007 for promoting the conference and financial support. The efforts of Atsuyuki Fukano, Zhyu Sun and Changjing Zhang for arranging the conference site and audio-visual equipment are appreciated. Also thanks are due to Masayo Fujita for maintaining the secretariat and Masako Oyanagi for coordinating social events. Lastly we wish to express our sincere thanks to the editorial team of IOP Publishing. Hiroyuki Oyanagi Chairman of LEHTSC2007