FUKUI--Fukui Prefecture, whose wealth of fossil finds has given it the moniker of “dinosaur kingdom,” is moving to open Japan’s first university faculty dedicated to dinosaur studies.

The new faculty at the Fukui Prefectural University will specialize in paleontology, geology and paleoclimatology focused on the extinct creatures, prefectural government officials said.

The courses will be designed to train not only researchers but also geological and civil engineers and experts in a broad range of industries, the officials said.

They plan to apply to the education ministry to establish the faculty by the end of fiscal 2023.

Approval is expected in fiscal 2024, and classes could start in spring 2025.

The new faculty will have only one department, which will offer courses on dinosaurs, paleontology, geology and paleoenvironment studies, according to the plan.

The admission quota will be 30 students a year.

First-year students in the new faculty will study liberal arts at the university’s Eiheiji Campus in the town of Eiheiji in the prefecture.

Sophomores, juniors and seniors will take specialized classes on a new Katsuyama campus to be developed beside the Fukui Prefectural Dinosaur Museum in Katsuyama city.

The 7,500-square-meter Katsuyama campus will be built on the No. 3 parking lot on the west side of the museum at a cost of 2.75 billion yen ($21 million).

The prefectural government earmarked 44 million yen in the initial budget of fiscal 2022 to cover the expenses for a schematic design and a geological survey of the campus site.

Kengo Kuma & Associates, a Tokyo-based office led by the eponymous architect, was designated last August to undertake the schematic design. The office helped to design the National Stadium for the Olympics held in the capital in 2021.

The campus project will enter the design stage in fiscal 2023, and construction will start in fiscal 2024.

The Dinosaur Museum is one of the largest museums of the sort in Japan.

The prefecture plans to have the new faculty and the museum work in tandem to allow joint use of facilities and research equipment. Museum researchers could also provide classes to the students and pass down skills for displays and storage.

The faculty will also promote digital paleontological research, including extensive use of computerized tomography (CT) scanning, virtual reality and other advanced technologies.

The campus is only a 10- to 15-minute drive to Japan’s biggest dinosaur quarry in the Kitadanicho district of Katsuyama. Students will have opportunities to take on-site lessons in excavating and cleaning fossils and other practical skills.

Prefectural government officials said the graduates could land jobs in a wide variety of fields: policymaking; education; research; information technology; geology, including soil mechanics and road measurements; civil engineering; construction; tourism; and publishing and reporting.

Work is under way to select teaching staff and draw up the curriculum.

The Dinosaur Museum in Katsuyama has 4,500 square meters of exhibition space. Various specimens, including 44 dinosaur skeletons, are on display there.

The museum attracted more than 900,000 visitors per year before the novel coronavirus pandemic struck.

Many other places in Fukui Prefecture have a dinosaur theme.

Three dinosaur monuments arranged outside JR Fukui Station in the prefectural capital are designed to emit cries and move their mouths, heads and trunks.

The biggest one, a Fukuititan, measures 10 meters long and 6 meters tall. The other two are a Fukuisaurus and a Fukuiraptor.

A statue of a dinosaur in a white frock, called “Dr. Dinosaur,” sits on a bench at the station.

The “dinosaur kingdom” nickname has its origins in the 1982 discovery of a complete, fossilized skeleton of a Cretaceous crocodile in the Kitadanicho district.

A fossilized tooth of a carnivorous dinosaur was found in neighboring Ishikawa Prefecture around the same time.

That prompted intensive excavation work in the Kitadanicho district, which resulted in a large quantity of dinosaur fossils.

Nine new dinosaur species found in Japan have been given scientific names, including five discovered in Fukui Prefecture. The five have all been named after the prefecture, including Fukuiraptor.

Hiroshi Nishi, head of Fukui Prefectural University’s Dinosaur Research Institute, said much credit should go to Yoichi Azuma, former head of the institute who led the excavation work.

“Mr. Azuma played a central role in scientifically classifying the dinosaur fossils unearthed in Fukui Prefecture, giving them zoological names as new species and publishing scientific articles on them,” Nishi said.