Cellular responses to environmental stimuli
Interdisciplinary Research Unit
Yamashita and Otsubo Group
Cells sense the environment around them, for example the amount of nutrients and hormones,
as well as the temperature and pressure, and decide what kind of activities to undertake using this information.
Germ cells, which produce sperm and eggs, begin halving their number of chromosomes
during a special kind of cell division called meiosis, in response to the ambient conditions.
In our laboratory we use the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe, the simplest organism that performs meiosis,
to research the mechanism by which cells switch from mitosis,
the kind of cell division that divides cells equally to create two identical cells, to meiosis,
which is essential for bringing forth genetically diverse progeny.
We have been trying to elucidate how fission yeast cells switch their mode of cell cycle from mitotic to meiotic.
We focus on a highly conserved kinase, namely Target of rapamycin (TOR) kinase,
which plays key roles in the recognition of nutrition and the onset of sexual differentiation in fission yeast.
Expression of hundreds of genes is upregulated during meiosis. We have shown that specific control of the stability of meiotic transcripts,
which is orchestrated by the interplay between RNA-binding proteins and a long non-coding RNA,
contributes to the meiosis-specific gene expression in fission yeast.
Understanding precise mechanisms of this control will shed light on the regulation of timely gene expression during meiosis.
Specially Appointed Associate Professor |
Akira YAMASHITA |
Specially Appointed Assistant Professor |
Yoko OTSUBO |
Technical Staff | Atsuko NAKADE |
National Institute for Basic Biology
Nishigonaka 38, Myodaiji, Okazaki, Aichi, 444-8585, Japan
TEL: +81-564-55-7512
FAX: +81-564-55-7656