Since its founding in 1876 as the first graduate school in the United States, the Johns Hopkins University has had an international character and attracted young scholars and students from Japan. We are proud to mention Inazo Nitobe among them, who studied at Johns Hopkins for three years and whose friendship with Woodrow Wilson during that time is well known.

The Department of Mathematics of Johns Hopkins shares a distinguished history with other departments of the University since the days of J.J. Sylvester, who was the first professor of mathematics and started the first mathematical journal in the United States. A close tie between the department and the Japanese mathematical community was initiated by Kunihiko Kodaira, who spent four years at Johns Hopkins, 1950-51 and 1962-65, and who received the Fields Medal, the premier international prize in mathematics, in 1954. Since the late 1950s, the department has entertained a steady flow of young Japanese mathematicians and students. A list of those who spent at least a semester at Johns Hopkins includes the following professors and leaders of the Japanese mathematical community: K. Aomoto, H. Gunji, A. Hattori, T. Kimura, K. Kodaira, M. Kuga , H. Matsumura, T. Miyake, H. Morikawa, T. Shioda, T. Tamagawa, I. Tamura , H. Yoshizawa. At the present moment the department has two Japanese professors, Jun-ichi Igusa since 1955 and Takashi Ono since 1969.

The Japan-U.S. Mathematics Institute, abbreviated as JAMI, was established in 1988 through the efforts of Jun-ichi Igusa, who became the founding Director, and Jean-Pierre Meyer, then Department Chairman, with the understanding and strong support of Steven Muller, then President of the University, and of Lloyd Armstrong, Jr., then Dean of the School of Arts & Sciences. JAMI was established following the internationalist tradition of Johns Hopkins outlined above. During the planning phase for these efforts, the organizers consulted and were strongly encouraged by Heisuke Hironaka and E.O. Reischauer who agreed to serve as Honorary Co-Chairmen.

The goal of JAMI is to foster friendly relationships between Japan and the United States; its academic purpose is to formalize and extend the long-existing relationship between the department and the Japanese mathematical community, and to use that relationship more generally to further mathematical interactions between the two countries.