Ryuzo Yanagimachi

Ryuzo Yanagimachi (Japanese: 柳町 隆造 "Yanagimachi Ryūzō"; August 29 1928– ) is a pioneer in the cloning field. In 1997 his laboratory at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa successfully cloned mice using the Honolulu technique. The first one was a female named Cumulina from the cells that surround the developing ovarian follicle in mice.

Early years

Yanagimachi was born in Japan. He received a BS in zoology in 1952 and a DSc in animal embryology in 1960 from Hokkaido University. He then taught high school for one year because he could not find a research job.

Yanagimachi applied for a post-doctoral position with Dr. M. C. Chang of the Worcester Foundation for Experimental Biology in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts. He got this position and there discovered how to fertilize hamster eggs "in vitro." This work led to in vitro fertilization of eggs of human and other mammalian species.

In 1966 he returned to Hokkaido University as a temporary lecturer with the possibility of later being appointed to an assistant professorship. However, another person eventually got the professorship.

Yanagimachi ended up at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa, where he has been now for over forty years. During his time there he has become a full professor of anatomy, biochemistry, physiology and reproductive biology at the John A. Burns School of Medicine. He retired the end of 2004 to become a professor emeritus, but keeps working with junior fellows.

He is married to Hiroko, a former child psychologist. She could not find work in her field when they came to the U.S. due to a language barrier, so she went to work with researchers in his lab as an electron microscopist. They have no children. [ [http://partners.nytimes.com/library/national/072498sci-cloner-profile.html Cloning Pioneer Is Focused and Creative in His Research ] ]

Cloning

In July 1998 the Yanagimachi laboratory published work in "Nature" on cloning mice from adult cells. Yanagimachi named the new cloning technique they had created to do this work the "Honolulu technique". The first mouse born was named Cumulina, after the cumulus cells whose nuclei were used to clone her. At the time of the publication of this work over fifty mice spanning three generations had been produced through this technique. [ [http://starbulletin.com/98/07/22/news/story1.html Honolulu Star-Bulletin Local News ] ]

This work was done by an international team of scientists dubbed "Team Yanagimachi" or "Team Yana" for short. This team included co-authors Teruhiko "Teru" Wakayama (also a native of Japan), Anthony "Tony" Perry (United Kingdom), Maurizio Zuccotti (Italy), and K. R. Johnson (United States).

The Yanagimachi laboratory moved from the warehouse which had housed it for over thirty years into the newly created Institute for Biogenesis Research in the biomedical tower of the John A. Burns School of Medicine. Money and renown from the opportunities opened up by the "Nature" article made the institute possible.

Yanagimachi was made director of the institute and appointed Perry and Wakayama as heads of two of the institute's five research units. Wakayama had been a post-doctoral fellow and Perry (a British citizen) a European fellow when they did the cloning work with Yanagimachi. Both Perry and Wakayama are currently employed by the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology in [Kobe, Japan}. The Yanagimachi laboratory continues to make advances in cloning. The first male animal cloned from adult cells was announced in 1999. In 2004 the laboratory participated in the cloning of an infertile male mouse. This advance may be used to produce many infertile animals for use in research in human infertility. [ [http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2004/Dec/23/ln/ln20p.html UH team makes cloning advance - The Honolulu Advertiser - Hawaii's Newspaper ] ]

Mice cloned by the Honolulu technique were displayed at the Bishop Museum in Honolulu, Hawaii, and the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Illinois.

Yanagimachi had been intending to write a book about his life's work. Unfortunately many of his original notes were lost in the October 2004 flood at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa, which damaged many buildings on campus including the one housing his laboratories. This flood caused over US $2 million worth of damage to the Yanagimachi laboratories alone. [ [http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2004/Nov/02/ln/ln25p.html Cloning, medical research hit hard by flooding at UH - The Honolulu Advertiser - Hawaii's Newspaper ] ]

Other work

The Yanagimachi lab's major studies have been the analyses of the process and mechanims of normal fertilization. They pioneered intracytoplasmic sperm injection which overcomes many forms of male infertility. They were the first to produce nomral (mouse) offspring using prespermatozoal cells such as round spermatids and freeze-dried spermatozoa. It was announced in March 2004 that the Yanagimachi laboratory had helped to produce a live birth of a mammal other than a mouse from freeze-dried sperm. The rabbit kit was born at the Dr. Jerry Yang's laboratory [http://web.uconn.edu/crb/yang.htm] at University of Connecticut, but soon died because the mother did not care for it [ [http://www.biolreprod.org/cgi/content/full/70/6/1776 Freeze-Dried Sperm Fertilization Leads to Full-Term Development in Rabbits - Liu et al. 70 (6): 1776 - Biology of Reproduction ] ] . The lab supplied the freeze-dried sperm. [ [http://starbulletin.com/2004/03/08/news/story7.html Honolulu Star-Bulletin Hawaii News ] ]

Awards and honors

*Zoological Society Prize, Japan. 1977
*University of Hawaii Regents' Medal for Excellence in Research 1988
*Marshall Medal, Society for the Study of Fertility, UK. 1994
*International Prize of Biology, Japan. 1996
*Honorable Degree of Philosophy from the University of Rome, Italy. 1997.
*Distinguished Andrologist Award, American Society of Andrology, 1998
*Induction to the Polish Academy of Scicnes, Poland. 1998.
*Carl G. Hartman Award, Society for the Study of Reproduction, USA,1999
*Pioneer Award, International Embryo Transfer Society, 2000
*Elected to the National Academy of Sciences 2001
*Honrable Degree of Philosophy from the Hokkaido University, Japan. 2002
*Induction to National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Hall of Honor 2003

References

External links

* [http://www.msichicago.org/exhibit/genetics/cloning.html Museum of Science and Industry exhibit containing cloned mice]
* [http://www.hawaii.edu/cmb/facultyinfo/yanagimachi.htm Faculty research page]