Stelic Institute & Co.

Message

Message

Through advanced research, stem cells have begun to make their presence felt in medicine and to bring a great light of hope to patients still languishing in the dark of incurable diseases. To make real the promise of stem cell medicine, a standing question needs to be addressed. How do stem cells and their daughter cells stream within each organ in normal and disease conditions? Hope always directs us toward the challenging theme. Stelic tries to lift stem cell medicine from just a dream to solid reality by controlling “dynamic remodeling of tissue structures.” The key of control is within a niche, not just in healthy people but in all people suffered from diseases. With our vision we will be able to meet the challenge together, knowing that we will get a real feeling for how our body lives.

Career

After graduation of Niigata University Graduate School of Medical & Dental Sciences (1993), spent 8 years as a clinical and research fellow in emergency and critical medicine and gastroenterology. Since 2001 involved in the basic science at Graduate School of Medicine, The University of Tokyo as a postdoctoral fellow and later, project assistant professor. Extensively investigated the pathophysiological roles of chemokines in vivo in disease models, discovered two novel cell types in the bloodstream, namely dendritic cell precursors as master cells to induce host immunity against danger-signals, identified portal tract-associated lymphoid tissue (PALT) as a niche for local immunity in the liver, and established the role of chemokines in the renewal of colonic crypt and pancreatic β cells during ulcerative colitis and type I diabetes, respectively.

Pioneer works focusing on spatial and temporal communication of vital cells in pathological niches in vivo. These works were widely acclaimed and published in 5th edition of Who’s Who in Medicine & Healthcare. Current interests; 1) Visualization of adult tissue stem cells in living animals, 2) Molecular mechanisms underlying stem cell traffic, that is, “dynamic remodeling of tissue structures.”