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Molecular Membrane Biology Laboratory
Akihiko NAKANO
Chief Scientist
Akihiko NAKANO (D.Sci.)
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Research Areas

In eukaryotic cells, vesicular transport is essential for dynamic membrane traffic among organelles. Our laboratory focuses on the roles of vesicular trafficking in the secretory pathway and aims at elucidating the molecular mechanisms of vesicle budding and fusion, and unveiling the secrets of molecular recognition and sorting during these processes. We are also concerned with the fact that the secretory processes are important for determination of cell polarity, directions of cell division and elongation, and will pursue how they contribute to the morphogenesis of tissues and organs. As experimental systems, we use the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae for detailed molecular and genetic analyses, and higher plants Arabidopsis for expansion to multicellular systems. Every kind of methodology, including molecular genetics, biochemistry and cell biology (especially "live cell imaging"), is being employed.

Research Subject

  1. Study of the Roles of Membrane Trafficking in the Morphogenesis of Higher Plants
  2. Study of the Molecular Mechanisms of Vesicle Formation and Fusion in the Secretory Pathway
  3. Study of the Mechanisms of Protein Sorting during Membrane Trafficking

Related links

  1. RIKEN Advanced Science Institute Website_Laboratories PageNew Window
  2. Individual Website Laboratory PageNew Window

RIKEN RESEARCH

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List of Selected Publications

  1. Michiyo Okamoto, Kazuo Kurokawa, Kumi Matsuura-Tokita, Chieko Saito, Ryogo Hirata, and Akihiko Nakano.:
    "High-curvature domains of the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) are important for the organization of ER exit sites in Saccharomyces cerevisiae"
    J. Cell Sci. in press
  2. Tomohiro Uemura, Hyeran Kim, Chieko Saito, Kazuo Ebine, Takashi Ueda, Paul Schulze-Lefert, and Akihiko Nakano.:
    "Qa-SNAREs localized to the trans-Golgi network regulate multiple transport pathways and extracellular disease resistance in plants"
    Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 109:1784-1789 (2012)
  3. Nobuhiro Morishima, Keiko Nakanishi, and Akihiko Nakano.:
    "Activating transcription factor-6 (ATF6) mediates apoptosis with reduction of myeloid cell leukemia sequence 1 (Mcl-1) via induction of WW domain binding protein 1"
    J. Biol. Chem. 286:35227-35235 (2011)
  4. Chieko Saito, Tomohiro Uemura, Chie Awai, Motoki Tominaga, Kazuo Ebine, Jun Ito, Takashi Ueda, Hiroshi Abe, Miyo Terao Morita, Masao Tasaka, and Akihiko Nakano.:
    "The occurence of bulbs, a complex configuration of the vacuolar membrane, is affected by mutations vacuolar SNARE and phospholipase in Arabidopsis"
    Plant J. 68:64-73 (2011)
  5. Kazuo Ebine, Masaru Fujimoto, Yusuke Okatani, Tomoaki Nishiyama, Tatsuaki Goh, Emi Ito, Tomoko Dainobu, Aiko Nishitani, Tomohiro Uemura, Masa H. Sato, Hans Thordal-Christensen, Nobuhiro Tsutsumi, Akihiko Nakano, and Takashi Ueda.:
    "A membrane trafficking pathway regulated by the plant-specific RAB GTPase ARA6"
    Nat. Cell Biol. 13:853-859 (2011)
  6. Yuki Hamamura, Chieko Saito, Chie Awai, Daisuke Kurihara, Atsushi Miyawaki, Tsuyoshi Nakagawa, Masahiro M Kanaoka, Narie Sasaki, Akihiko Nakano, Frédéric Berger, and Tetsuya Higashiyama.:
    "Live cell imaging reveals the dynamics of two sperm cells during double fertilization in Arabidopsis thaliana"
    Curr. Biol. 21:497-502 (2011)
  7. Satoshi Naramoto, Jürgen Kleine-Vehn, Stéphanie Robert, Masaru Fujimoto, Tomoko Dainobu, Tomasz Paciorek, Takashi Ueda, Akihiko Nakano, Marc C. E. Van Montagua, Hiroo Fukuda, and Jiří Friml.:
    "ADP-ribosylation factor machinery mediates endocytosis in plant cells"
    Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. in press.
  8. Tamami Uejima, Kentaro Ihara, Tatsuaki Goh, Emi Ito, Mariko Sunada, Takashi Ueda, Akihiko Nakano, and Soichi Wakatsuki.:
    "GDP-bound and nucleotide-free intermediates of the guanine nucleotide exchange in the Rab5/Vps9 system"
    J. Biol. Chem. 285:36689-36697 (2010)
  9. Masaru Fujimoto, Shin-ichi Arimura, Takashi Ueda, Hideki Takanashi, Yoshikazu Hayashi, Akihiko Nakano, and Nobuhiro Tsutsumi.:
    "Arabidopsis dynamin-related proteins DRP2B and DRP1A participate together in clathrin-coated vesicle formation during endocytosis"
    Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 107:6094-6099 (2010)
  10. Kazuhito V. Tabata, Ken Sato, Toru Ide, Takayuki Nishizaka, Akihiko Nakano, and Hiroyuki Noji.:
    "Visualization of cargo concentration by COPII minimal machinery in a planar lipid membrane"
    EMBO J. 28:3279-3289 (2009)

Members

Principal Investigator

Akihiko NAKANO
Chief Scientist

Staff Scientist

Shozo FUJIOKA
Vice Chief Scientist
Nobuhiro MORISHIMA
Senior Research Scientist
Kazuo KUROKAWA
Senior Research Scientist
Motoki TOMINAGA
Senior Research Scientist
Hiroshi ABE
Senior Research Scientist
Ryogo HIRATA
Senior Research Scientist

Postdoctoral Fellow

Keiko NAKANISHI
Contract Researcher
Yasuyuki SUDA
Contract Researcher

Technical Assistant

Keiko SHODA
Technical Staff I
Rie KAJIYAMA
Technical Staff I
Reiko KIUCHI
Technical Staff I
Eriko FURUYAMA
Technical Staff I
Erina MATSUMOTO
Technical Staff II
Masami TASHIRO
Technical Staff II