Photo/Illutration “Mirai Ningen Sentakuki” (human washing machine of the future), currently being developed by Osaka-based Science Co. for the 2025 Osaka Kansai Expo, is shown in Osaka’s Yodogawa Ward on Oct. 23. (Kazuhito Suwa)

OSAKA--A futuristic “human washing machine” that caused a stir at the 1970 Japan World Exposition has undergone a 21st century makeover for the Osaka Kansai Expo in April.

The original machine, exhibited by Sanyo Electric Co., now Panasonic Holdings Corp., didn’t catch on commercially.

But more than a half century later, Osaka-based showerhead maker Science Co. is developing the new version based on cutting-edge technology.

It plans to exhibit the “Mirai Ningen Sentakuki” (human washing machine of the future) inside the Osaka Healthcare Pavilion run by the Osaka prefectural and city governments.

Visitors to the exhibition site will be allowed to try it out.

The company is also planning to release a home-use edition.

“We’re about 70 percent there,” said the company chairman, Yasuaki Aoyama, during a lecture held here Oct. 23. “We plan to offer 1,000 general visitors an opportunity to use it during the expo.”

Aoyama said seven to eight people will be able to experience a “wash-and-dry” job each day.

The company is accepting reservations on a special page on its website.

The human washing machine is shaped like the cockpit of a jet fighter. It even has a transparent cover that opens to the back.

The device partially fills with hot water when the bather sits in the seat in the center. Sensors embedded in the seat measure the person’s pulse and other biological data to ensure the bather is washed at an appropriate temperature.

At the same time, an AI system determines whether the user is calm or excited, and projects images on the inside of the transparent cover to help the person feel refreshed.

A wash and dry takes 15 minutes.

Sanyo Electric’s human washing machine exhibited during the 1970 event was called Ultrasonic Bath.

When the bather sat inside the egg-shaped tub, it automatically filled with hot water and emitted ultrasound waves.

It also released plastic balls to massage the person’s body.

Visitors waited in long lines to glimpse the exhibit, and Aoyama, who was a fourth-grader living in the city at the time, was among them.

He said his imagination went into overdrive when he saw the machine.

At the time, many homes had no bath and people routinely used public bathhouses.

“It made me excited, thinking about what kind of future there would be,” he recalled.

Now that his company deals in bathtubs and showerheads developed with technology that utilizes microscopic bubbles to clean the body of the bather, he decided to create his dream machine in time for the expo.

“We will offer a new human washing machine as a legacy from the 1970 expo,” Aoyama said.

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