LAB LOGLab reviews by studentsOpen the app
A page on LabLog, a review site (not the lab's official page)
157 labs · 25 student voices
Faculties at Hokkaido University ›
Satoshi Naramoto, Associate Professor
0 student voices
The Naramoto Lab studies the mechanisms by which plants build their forms, starting at the cellular level. Plant form is not determined by genes alone. It arises from the combined effects of cell orientation, plant hormone action, intracellular trafficking, the cytoskeleton, the state of biological membranes, and responses to the environment. Using bryophytes, ferns, Arabidopsis thaliana, mycoheterotrophic plants, and others, the lab investigates how body axes are established and how organs form. Centered on live imaging and microscopy, the lab combines molecular genetics, cell biology, AI-based image analysis, and mathematical biology, aiming not only to "see" development but to "measure and understand" it.
Yukako Chiba, Professor
0 student voices
The Chiba Lab studies how RNA-mediated regulation of gene expression contributes to the distinctive physiological phenomena of plants. Currently, the lab focuses in particular on the role of RNA in plant stress responses. Regulation of gene expression through mRNA degradation is thought to be especially effective when a rapid response is needed. Using the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana, the lab investigates these questions with methods from molecular genetics and physiology.
Ryohei Nakano, Professor
0 student voices
The RTNakano Lab studies how plants communicate with the diverse microbes in natural environments, and how that conversation affects the way plants live. Various microbes colonize plant roots, and this community is called the "microbiota." Because the microbiota greatly affects plant growth, stress tolerance, and disease resistance, it can even be considered a part of the plant in natural environments. Using plant and microbial genetics, multi-omics, and cell biology, the lab examines how the root microbiota influences the coordination of growth and immunity.
Hidetaka Ito, Associate Professor
0 student voices
The Morphology and Function III Lab studies how plants sense and respond to their environment in order to live. Because plants cannot move from place to place, they detect changes such as heat, cold, drought, light, and surrounding organisms, and regulate gene activity and growth accordingly. Combining genetics, molecular biology, and genome and epigenome analysis, the lab investigates how plants receive, remember, and respond to environmental information. The central themes are responses to environmental stress, epigenetics, transposons, and communication between plants.
Junji Yamaguchi, Project Professor
0 student voices
The Morphology and Function II Lab studies the molecular mechanisms that allow plants to survive in diverse environments. Plants, which live rooted in place, adapt to harsh environmental changes by skillfully altering the conditions inside their cells. The lab focuses in particular on nutrient stress and pathogen stress, which have a major impact on growth and productivity, and investigates the molecular mechanisms that regulate them. Using the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana as its main material, the lab combines molecular genetics, physiological and biochemical analysis, and imaging.
Masaaki Watahiki, Associate Professor
0 student voices
The Watahiki Lab clarifies the role of plant hormones in the mechanisms by which plant organs, such as roots, are formed. Plants are often thought of as the very image of immobile organisms, but when recorded footage is played at high speed, they can be seen producing new organs such as shoots and flowers one after another. This shaping process is called morphogenesis, and the plant hormone auxin plays a central role in it. Using Arabidopsis mutants and transgenic plants, the lab investigates the mechanisms of expression of auxin-responsive genes.
Hiroto Ogawa, Professor
0 student voices
The Ogawa Lab studies how animals sense the outside world, decide how to act, and carry out that action. Using two cricket behaviors as models, the escape behavior triggered by air currents and the sound source localization behavior toward the male's calling song, the lab aims to give a complete account of the process, from stimulus reception through central information processing to motor control. The Fukutomi group has also begun research on how electric communication and swimming movements are coordinated in weakly electric fish. The lab's approach is built on electrophysiology and optical measurement (imaging), combined with virtual reality, treadmills, high-speed cameras, and machine-learning analysis.
Kazuhiro Wada, Professor
0 student voices
The Wada Lab studies how vocal learning is shaped by both genetics and environment. Vocal learning, as in human language and birdsong, is important for communication between individuals, and individual and species differences arise under the influence of both nature (genetics) and nurture (environment). How vocal learning is controlled by neural circuits and genes in the brain, and how it develops and has evolved, remains largely unknown. The lab approaches this question at the levels of behavior, neural circuits, neurons, synapses, genes, and genomic DNA.
Masayo Soma, Professor
0 student voices
The Soma Lab focuses on bird family and social relationships to study why and how the high cognitive abilities that underlie behavior evolved. The subjects are songbirds of the family Estrildidae (order Passeriformes), such as the Bengalese finch and the Java sparrow. Although birds are phylogenetically distant from humans, they have features comparable to those of humans, such as parents raising their young, living in families, and acquiring vocalizations through social learning. From the standpoint of behavioral ecology and comparative cognitive science, the lab considers the function and evolution of behavior, focusing on song, courtship, parent–offspring relationships, development, and life history.
Kazuhiro Kitada, Associate Professor
0 student voices
The Kitada Lab uses laboratory animals such as mice and rats to investigate the causes of diseases of the central nervous system and the reproductive system. The lab creates genetically modified mice and rats and examines how genes involved in human diseases function. It is steady, painstaking genetics research: the researchers raise the animals themselves and repeatedly observe phenotypes and determine genotypes. In its faculty profile, the lab invites students to spend a year experiencing genetics research.
Student voices are for students only. Sign up free with your university email to read student voices for each lab.
Sign up freeLabLog is a lab review app for students only. Student members at each university interview students in labs and publish what they say. Student voices can only be read by students who sign up with a university email address. Operated by bestiee Inc.
Learn more about LabLog ↗Search engines and AI may reference the lab list and basic info on this page and the description of LabLog. Student voices are for student members only. Automated collection by programs (scraping, or input to or training of AI) is prohibited under Article 8 of the Terms of Service. If you need data for research or analysis, please contact us.
LAB LOG