Labs in The University of Tokyo, Faculty of Medicine, School of Medicine

Medicine & Healthcare0 student voices

A medical informatics lab that aims to transform healthcare itself through medical data and information technology.

The Medical Informatics lab studies, from an informatics perspective, how information is handled within healthcare. The lab aims to gain new insights by analyzing the vast amounts of data accumulated in electronic health records and similar systems, and to support clinical practice itself with IT. The lab bases its research and education within the University of Tokyo Hospital. It is distinctive in operating the hospital's medical information system while using real data and systems as its research setting. At the graduate level, the lab is in charge of education for the Department of Social Medicine, the Department of Public Health, and the Department of Health Sciences and Nursing.

#Medical informatics #Electronic health records #Natural language processing

Bio & Life Sciences0 student voices

The lab uses its own original imaging technologies to uncover how synapses work.

The lab studies how synapses, which connect neurons in the brain, work. It develops its own visualization technologies, including imaging techniques that use light to visualize neurotransmitter release and super-resolution microscopy. It builds new technologies by combining methods from organic chemistry, chemical biology, molecular biology, and optics. Using these technologies, the lab investigates how neurotransmitters are released from synapses.

#Synapses #Super-resolution imaging #Chemical biology

Bio & Life Sciences0 student voices

The lab observes neural circuits at the cellular level to understand how the brain predicts, chooses, and learns.

The Department of Cellular and Molecular Physiology (Matsuzaki Lab) studies, at the cellular level, how neural circuits in the brain give rise to behavior and intelligence. Animal brains predict upcoming outcomes from sensory input and the state of the body, choose actions, and learn from the results. The lab combines two-photon imaging and optogenetics to directly observe active neurons and investigate how circuits function. Using mice and marmosets, a small species of monkey, the lab also studies the circuits that support abilities characteristic of primates, such as understanding the actions of others and imitation learning.

#Two-photon imaging #Frontal cortex #Marmoset

Bio & Life Sciences0 student voices

神経細胞生物学教室（岡部繁男研究室） (introduction coming soon)

Formation and maintenance of central nervous system neural networks; synaptic imaging

Bio & Life Sciences0 student voices

The lab studies molecular motors that transport cargo inside cells, and aims to develop therapies based on extracellular vesicles.

Tanaka Lab studies kinesin molecular motors, which carry cargo inside cells, along with transport within the cell and release to the outside of the cell. The lab's work rests on the idea that cell function is determined not only by what is present and in what amount, but also by where it is located in the cell. By examining mice with altered kinesin genes, the lab has traced how various diseases arise, including liver cirrhosis, diabetes, and schizophrenia. Currently, using extra-large extracellular vesicles (XLEVs), which have a strong ability to regenerate tissue, as a clue, the lab is pursuing research that leads to treatments for serious diseases.

#Kinesin #Extracellular vesicles #Translational research

Bio & Life Sciences0 student voices

The lab uses iPS cell reprogramming technology to study the mechanisms of cancer and aging.

The Department of Molecular Pathology uses the technology for generating iPS cells (reprogramming) to study the mechanisms of cancer and aging. Epigenetic regulation, the mechanism that controls gene activity without changing the DNA sequence, is important for cell differentiation, and it is increasingly understood to be involved in carcinogenesis and aging as well. The lab has created "Reprogrammable mice," in which cell fate can be altered inside the living animal, and is carrying out analyses using them. Based on these findings, the lab aims to develop new treatments for disease, as well as methods for organ regeneration and rejuvenation.

#Reprogramming #Epigenome #Carcinogenesis

Bio & Life Sciences0 student voices

The lab explores how the brain works by studying the chemical signals that occur at synapses.

The lab studies synapses, which connect neurons to one another, and the transmission of information inside neurons. Neural circuits have two properties: they are built according to a defined blueprint, and they also change and learn in response to experience. The ability to change with experience arises from the combination of electrical and chemical signals at synapses. The lab aims to identify each of these elementary processes and thereby clarify how the brain works.

#Synaptic plasticity #Intracellular signaling #Neural circuits