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Mako Nakamura Last modified date:2023.10.17

Professor / Faculty of Agriculture, Center for Promotion of International Education and Research
Attached Promotive Center for International Education and Research of Agriculture
Faculty of Agriculture


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Homepage
https://kyushu-u.elsevierpure.com/en/persons/mako-nakamura
 Reseacher Profiling Tool Kyushu University Pure
https://researchmap.jp/makonakamura?lang=en
My page on researchmap website .
http://www.agr.kyushu-u.ac.jp/lab/nakamura-lab/
The Nakamura lab. HP .
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=GYDESeYAAAAJ&hl=ja
Google Scholar .
Academic Degree
Ph.D.
Country of degree conferring institution (Overseas)
No
Field of Specialization
Muscle Biology, Developmental Biology, Cell Biology
ORCID(Open Researcher and Contributor ID)
0000-0002-6129-7560
Total Priod of education and research career in the foreign country
05years00months
Outline Activities
1. Research
My research focus is to understand mechanism of muscle stem cell development and Differentiation. There are several projects on going.
A. Smooth muscle cells.
1) Smooth muscle cell differentiation and development in chick gizzard.
2) Smooth muscle cell fate mapping
B. Skeletal muscle cells.
3) Muscle stem cell marker, Pax7 function on myocyte/adipocyte cell differentiation
4) Peroxisome specific marker Nudt7 involvement on muscle cell differentiation and muscle development


2. Education
1) Problem Based Learning I, II (Graduate School of Bioresource and Bioenvironmental Sciences)
2) Advanced Animal and Marine Science (Graduate School of Bioresource and Bioenvironmental Sciences)
3) Genetics and Evolution (School of Interdisciplinary Science and Innovation)
4) Developmental Biology (School of Interdisciplinary Science and Innovation)

3. International Education
1). Management of short-term oversea programs in school of Agriculture
2). Management of short-term inbound programs in school of Agriculture and graduate school of Bioresource and Bioenvironmental Sciences.
Research
Research Interests
  • My research focus is to understand mechanism of muscle stem cell development and Differentiation. There are several projects on going.
    A. Smooth muscle cells.
    1) Smooth muscle cell differentiation and development in chick gizzard.
    2) Smooth muscle cell fate mapping
    B. Skeletal muscle cells.
    3) Muscle stem cell marker, Pax7 function on myocyte/adipocyte cell differentiation
    4) Peroxisome specific marker Nudt7 involvement on muscle cell differentiation and muscle development

    keyword : Animal development, skeletal muscle, visceral smooth muscle, differentiation
    2002.04~2030.06.
Current and Past Project
  • We previously showed that Semaphorin 3A (Sema3A) expression was induced when quiescent muscle satellite cells were stimulated by hepatocyte growth factor and became activated satellite cells (ASCs). However, how Sema3A regulates genes in the early phase of ASCs remains unclear. In this study, we investigated whether Sema3A signaling can regulate the early phase of ASCs, an important satellite cell stage for postnatal growth, repair, and maintenance of skeletal muscle. We showed that expression of the myogenic proliferation regulatory factors Pax7 and Myf5 was decreased in myoblasts transfected with Sema3A siRNA. These cells failed to activate expression MyoD, another myogenic proliferation regulatory factor, during differentiation. Interestingly, some of the Sema3A-depleted cells did not express Pax7 and MyoD and had enlarged nuclei and very large cytoplasmic areas. We also observed that Pax7 and Myf5 expression was increased in Myc-Sema3A overexpressing myoblasts. BrdU analysis indicated that Sema3A regulated proliferation of ASCs. These findings suggest that Sema3A signaling can modulate expression of Pax7, Myf5, and MyoD. Moreover, we found that expression of emerin, an inner nuclear membrane protein, was regulated by Sema3A signaling. Emerin was identified by positional cloning as the gene responsible for the X-linked form of Emery-Dreifuss muscular dystrophy (X-EDMD). In conclusion, our results support a role for Sema3A in maintaining ASCs through regulation, via emerin, of Pax7, Myf5, and MyoD expression.
  • Myogenesis is precisely proceeded by myogenic regulatory factors. Myogenic stem cells are activated, proliferated and fused into a multinuclear myofiber. Pax7, paired box 7, one of the earliest markers during myogenesis. It has been reported that Pax7 regulates the muscle marker genes, Myf5 and MyoD toward differentiation. The possible roles of Pax7 in myogenic cells have been well researched. However, it has not yet been clarified if Pax7 itself is able to induce myogenic fate in nonmyogenic lineage cells. In this study, we performed experiments using stably expressed Pax7 in 3T3-L1 preadipocytes to elucidate if Pax7 inhibits adipogenesis. We found that Pax7 represses adipogenic markers and prevents differentiation. These cells showed decreased expression of PDGFRα, PPARγ and Fabp4 and inhibited forming lipid droplets.
Academic Activities
Papers
1. Nakamura M, Choe SK, Runko AP, Gardner PD, Sagerström CG., Nlz1/Znf703 acts as a repressor of transcription., BMC Dev Biol., 2008 Nov 12;8:108, 2008.11.
2. Nakamura M., Runko AP., and Sagerstrom CG, A novel subfamily of zinc finger genes involoved in embryonic development, J. Cell. Biochem., 2004.11.
Presentations
1. Wakana Izumi, Yuko Takuma, Wataru Mizunoya, Ryuichi Tatsumi and Mako Nakamura, Improving meat quality by regulating myogenic and adipogenic cell fate -A possible role of Paired box 7 (Pax7) during adipogenic differentiation-, nternational Symposium on Agricultural, Food, Environmental and Life Sciences in Asia (AFELiSA), 2019 (The 16th International Joint Symposium between Korea and Japan), 2019.11.
2. Kosuke Tokunaga, Shota Akimoto, Wataru Mizunoya, Ryuichi Tatsumi and Mako Nakamura, The serum-free media allows chick gizzard smooth muscle cells in differentiated state., nternational Symposium on Agricultural, Food, Environmental and Life Sciences in Asia (AFELiSA), 2019 (The 16th International Joint Symposium between Korea and Japan), 2019.11.
3. Mako Nakamura, Wakana Izumi, Wataru Mizunoya, and Ryuichi Tatsumi, Paired box 7 inhibits adipogenic differentiation -A possible role of Pax7 in non-myogenic cells-, Avian Model Systems 10, 2018.06, Myogenesis is precisely proceeded by myogenic regulatory factors. Myogenic stem cells are activated, proliferated and fused into a multinuclear myofiber. Pax7, paired box 7, one of the earliest markers during myogenesis. It has been reported that Pax7 regulates the muscle marker genes, Myf5 and MyoD toward differentiation. The possible roles of Pax7 in myogenic cells have been well researched. However, it has not yet been clarified if Pax7 itself is able to induce myogenic fate in non-myogenic lineage cells. We performed experiments using stably expressed Pax7 in 3T3-L1 preadipocytes to elucidate if Pax7 inhibits adipogenesis. These cells showed decreased expression of PDGFR, PPAR and Fabp4 and inhibited forming lipid droplets. However, they could not differentiate into myogenic cells. We think the Pax7 functions to pause cell differentiation and needs co-factors to induce into a specific cell type. To see the function of Pax7 in a cell type where possible myogenic co-factors may be available, we decided to use smooth muscle cells (SMCs). The SMCs culture model with E15 chick gizzard has been developed. The cells are cultured in the serum free medium supplemented with BSA and IGF-1. The cells are currently analyzed for the marker gene expression to find out if they keep the differentiation state..
Membership in Academic Society
  • The Japan Association for Global Competency Education
Awards
  • Award for reviewing grant proposal
Educational
Educational Activities
Class taught
1) Problem Based Learning I, II (English taught course: Graduate School of Bioresource and Bioenvironmental Sciences)
2) Cross-Cutting Themes in Animal & Aquatic Sciences (English taught course: Graduate School of Bioresource and Bioenvironmental Sciences)
3) Genetics and Evolution (Bilingual course: School of Interdisciplinary Science and Innovation)
4) Developmental Biology (Bilingual course: School of Interdisciplinary Science and Innovation)

~2017
1) M05 Current Topics in Agriculture and Food Environment (Graduate School of Bioresource and Bioenvironmental Sciences) 2).Japanese Research Progress in Life Science (JTW program)
Other Educational Activities
  • 2010.08.