Researchers at Politeknik Negeri Malang have repeatedly coauthored studies with Universitas Brawijaya and Japanese collaborators, a pattern of research coauthorship rather than a formal agreement.
Down the road from Universitas Brawijaya, researchers at Politeknik Negeri Malang, commonly called POLINEMA, keep turning up as coauthors on the same kind of papers Lab MGM produces.
POLINEMA is a state polytechnic focused on applied engineering education, separate from Universitas Brawijaya but based in the same city. In 2024, the journal Research and Practice in Technology Enhanced Learning published Evaluating the Kit-Build Concept Mapping Process Using Sub-Map Scoring. Its authors are Ridwan Rismanto, Yusuke Hayashi, and Tsukasa Hirashima of Hiroshima University in Japan, Aryo Pinandito of Universitas Brawijaya, and Banni Satria Andoko of POLINEMA. The paper examines Kit-Build, a method where students build concept maps from a kit of prepared elements rather than free drawing, and proposes scoring smaller sub-maps of a larger concept map to evaluate the building process more closely.
POLINEMA researchers Mustika Mentari, Yan Watequlis Syaifudin, and Alfiandi Aulia Rahmadani also appear on A Proposal of In Situ Authoring Tool with Visual-Inertial Sensor Fusion for Outdoor Location-Based Augmented Reality, published in the journal Electronics in January 2025 alongside Okayama University and Universitas Brawijaya researchers. Mentari holds a joint appointment at both Okayama University and POLINEMA. That paper describes a tool for placing virtual objects at real outdoor locations directly from a smartphone, aimed at simplifying augmented reality content creation for developers working in the field rather than at a desk.
Neither publication reflects a signed cooperation agreement between POLINEMA and Universitas Brawijaya or Lab MGM specifically. What the record shows is a recurring pattern: POLINEMA staff, largely from its Department of Information Technology, keep contributing to the same lines of research as Lab MGM affiliated researchers, through two separate Japanese connections. Andoko's concept mapping paper runs through Hiroshima University, while Mentari, Syaifudin, and Rahmadani's augmented reality paper runs through Okayama University instead.
