December 2nd, 2025
5 min read
Enabling human connection has long been one of NTT’s primary contributions to society. Over more than a century we have driven the progress of communications. This included establishing Japan’s nation-wide telephone infrastructure, enabling instant communication between people living far apart. Now, together with our partners, we are developing technological innovations that will allow people to experience human senses remotely, finding true sensory connection even from a vast distance.
At Osaka Expo 2025, the world exposition held in Japan from April to October 2025, NTT showed how we are shaping the future of communications technology that expands the ability to hear, watch, touch, smell, and taste, at great distances and remotely. And we also demonstrated how the Innovative Optical and Wireless Network (IOWN), will power this richly connected future.
IOWN, which includes an all-photonics network, is a concept and initiative aimed at realizing a world of well-being in which everyone can live smarter in their way, based on next-generation information and communications infrastructure centered on optical technology.
Future of the sense of sight
Back in 1970, at Japan World Exposition in Osaka, NTT showcased innovations that marked the future of communications, including a wireless telephone. At Osaka Expo 2025, we used real-time 3D transmission to make it possible for visitors to experience the excitement of that time all over again.
Osaka is now home to the Expo’70 Commemorative Park, located on the grounds where the Japan World Exposition was held in 1970. The park includes the Tower of the Sun, which was left in the park in memory of that Expo. We used spatial transfer technology running over IOWN so visitors could see the Tower of the Sun live in 3D, with no lag, 40 kilometers away at Expo 2025. By bringing remote locations and spaces together, we made it possible to share an environment beyond physical distance and to bridge 55 years of innovation.
IOWN technology, which uses photonics, is the key to this connection because it provides ultra-fast, ultra low-latency networking, communication at the speed of light.
Future of the senses of touch and hearing
Imagine being able to say hello and hug a friend who is miles away. Or reach out and touch your grandchild on the other side of the world, while also hearing their voice. At Osaka Expo 2025, we shared examples of how this rich remote human connection will one day be possible via an ultra-low latency, ultra-high speed, photonics-based IOWN infrastructure.
One of these examples is called Fure-au Denwa, which was showcased in two exhibits: High Five With Fure-au Denwa and Life With Fure-au Denwa, both of which extended communication beyond video and audio to include tactile sensations. Fure-au Denwa is a Japanese term which, loosely translated, means interactive, tactile communication over a telephone.
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High Five With Fure-au Denwa
connected the Kansai International Airport with the Japan Pavilion at Osaka Expo 2025. Travellers arriving at the airport were invited to use the system to interact with people at the Pavilion. Not only could they speak to each other, exchanging greetings in their own languages, but they could also high-five by touching round hand marks on both sides of the monitor which the person on the other end would feel as a tactile sensation. These “vibrotactile” sensations let people truly feel the presence of one another.
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The Fure-au Denwa Connecting Life exhibit
was showcased at the NTT Pavilion and the Dynamic Equilibrium of Life signature pavilion. Visitors shared tactile sensations by touching tables located in front of monitors, and they could feel one another’s heartbeats using a stethoscope device. The idea was to create an experience that emphasizes the flow of life and connection.
Another example was Remotouch, displayed in partnership with Toyota Boshoku Corporation, and connecting the NTT Pavilion with Quintbridge, a laboratory for social change located 20 kilometers away from the Expo 2025 site. A remote touch therapy experience, Remotouch allowed visitors to feel the hands of a friend, family member or therapist, along with hearing their voice and seeing their facial expressions, even though they weren’t in the same location.
The demo worked like this: A person would sit in a specially designed seat, wearing a haptic device that rested gently on their shoulders. Another person, located elsewhere, would softly touch a lever with their hands. The tactile information, facial expressions and voice of the remote user would be transmitted via an IOWN network to the haptic device, which used actuators to generate pressure and recreate the exact sensations applied to the lever by the remote user. It offered a seamless and immersive experience despite the physical distance, making participants feel as though they were being touched by real human hands.
As a developer from Toyota Boshoku said, “The comfort of touch, which cannot be conveyed by voice or images alone, is essential for the connection between people. Also, I think the emotional connection that comes from touching each other is very important. I believe that Remotouch is one of the technology outcomes that allows us to move beyond physical distance to emotional distance by delivering that warmth to people who are far away.”
IOWN is critical to all these examples because any lag in the network makes the feeling of touch seem unnatural, and IOWN makes it possible to convey the delicacy and strength of true human touch.
Future of the senses of smell and taste
You might see a scene of beautiful cherry blossoms or a stunning rose garden. But without the ability to smell those flowers, you don’t really get a full sensory experience. So Koumi Hakkou Corp. and NTT DATA have come together to create a device that reproduces different scents, making it possible to add the sense of smell to a digital video or image.
At Osaka Expo 2025 we demonstrated how, with a touch of a button, it will be possible to recreate a range of different scents from just five original ingredients, and those scents can be smelled and shared across locations using IOWN connections.
This technology can digitally capture and recreate scents by analyzing how people perceive different smells and recording them as data. For example, it can reproduce the scent of a rose, which naturally contains over 50 molecules, using only four synthetic molecules that aren’t found in the original flower. Using this data, the system can transmit scent information to a special diffuser that releases the recreated smell. This innovation makes it possible to share and experience scents in digital spaces like games, the metaverse, or advertising, and it also offers new ways to preserve and reproduce fragrances for many industries.
This also has an impact on the sense of taste, since humans don’t taste food with just our tongues. Much of what we think of as flavor actually comes from our sense of smell. When aromas travel through the nose to the brain, they blend with taste signals to create the full experience of sweetness, bitterness, and everything in between. Koumi Hakkou Corp. is creating scents to supplement the flavor of foods for people with dietary restrictions. While this wasn’t demonstrated at Osaka Expo 2025, it is another example of the future of human senses.
Extending the human sensory experience
The future of human connection is about bringing people closer when distance keeps them apart. By combining science, creativity and care, we can help people see, touch and even smell no matter where they are.
Connection means the warmth of being understood and the comfort of being together. As we design the future of human senses, and build a better future for today’s children, we want to make “being there” possible for everyone, everywhere. And we will do it using the power of NTT’s IOWN, making this connected future possible.
