National Institute for Basic Biology
(Written in 2018)
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 activities to undertake using that information. In particular, the germ cells that produce sperm and eggs begin halving their number of chromosomes during a special kind of cell division called meiosis, in response to ambient conditions. In our laboratory we use yeast, the simplest organism that performs meiosis, to examine the mechanism by which cells, according to the ambient conditions, switch from continuing to increase using the kind of cell division that divides cells equally to create two identical cells (called mitosis) to begin the process of meiosis, which is essential for bringing forth future genetically diverse generations.
Aoi, Y., Kawashima, S.A., Simanis, V., Yamamoto, M., and Sato, M. (2014). Optimization of the analogue-sensitive Cdc2/Cdk1 mutant by in vivo selection eliminates physiological limitations to its use in cell cycle analysis. Open biology 4, 140063.
Arata, M., Sato, M., Yamashita, A., and Yamamoto, M. (2014). The RNA-binding protein Spo5 promotes meiosis II by regulating cyclin Cdc13 in fission yeast. Genes Cells 19, 225-238.
Hirai, H., Arai, K., Kariyazono, R., Yamamoto, M., and Sato, M. (2014). The kinetochore protein Kis1/Eic1/Mis19 ensures the integrity of mitotic spindles through maintenance of kinetochore factors Mis6/CENP-I and CENP-A. PloS one 9, e111905.
Okada, N., Toda, T., Yamamoto, M., and Sato, M. (2014). CDK-dependent phosphorylation of Alp7-Alp14 (TACC-TOG) promotes its nuclear accumulation and spindle microtubule assembly. Mol. Biol. Cell 25, 1969-1982.
Otsubo, Y., Yamashita, A., Ohno, H., and Yamamoto, M. (2014). S. pombe TORC1 activates the ubiquitin-proteasomal degradation of the meiotic regulator Mei2 in cooperation with Pat1 kinase. J Cell Sci. 127, 2639-2646.
Shichino, Y., Yamashita, A., and Yamamoto, M. (2014). Meiotic long non-coding meiRNA accumulates as a dot at its genetic locus facilitated by Mmi1 and plays as a decoy to lure Mmi1. Open biology 4, 140022.
Togashi, N., Yamashita, A., Sato, M., and Yamamoto, M. (2014). Functional significance of nuclear export and mRNA binding of meiotic regulator Spo5 in fission yeast. BMC microbiology 14, 188.
