We were visited by Dr. Mikiya Tanaka, Metals Recycling Group Leader at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), who spoke on the subject "Recycling Valuable Metals by Solvent Extraction." His lecture covered a wide range of research, including minimum emission from electroless nickel plating processes, development of new extractants for separating platinum group metals, separation and recovery of rare-earth components from waste rare-earth magnets, and development of an energy-saving copper recycling process. After his lecture, Dr. Tanaka toured the HMC Works and Technology Development Center at our Hitachi Works.