About Morozumi and Nakase group in Watanabe Lab

Our research aims to elucidate intracellular signaling networks that sense and transmit diverse extracellular stimuli, with particular focus on the signaling pathways involved in cancerous cell proliferation and metabolic syndromes such as diabetes.

To identify and analyze novel components of the signaling pathways, the studies utilize the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe (Figure 1), which has been successfully used as a genetically amenable model system to investigate cellular regulatory mechanisms conserved from yeast to human.

Students in our laboratory are encouraged to design multifaceted approaches that logically combine research tools in molecular genetics, cell biology and biochemistry. Originally established in 1998 at University of California-Davis, our laboratory has been training researchers that can serve the international scientific community.

Fig. 1   Fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe.