About the Symposium

Emi K. Nishimura is the Professor of the Division of Aging and Regeneration, The Medical Research Institute, The University of Tokyo. She is a stem cell biologist recognized for her work on the mechanisms of stem cell aging. She is known particularly for her studies on the identification of melanocyte stem cells, mechanisms of hair graying, hair thinning, and melanoma development as well as the essential roles of stem cell competition in physiological tissue homeostasis and aging. Dr. Nishimura has been a professor at Kanazawa University (2006-2009), at Tokyo Medical and Dental University (2009-2022), and currently at the Medical Research Institute, The University of Tokyo (2021-). She has received numerous awards, including The Japan Academy Medal in 2012 and Science and Technology Award. In 2022, Dr. Nishimura was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.

Dr. Ting Chen is a Principle Investigator at the National Institute of Biological Sciences in Beijing China. Dr. Chen received her Ph.D. from University of Virginia in 2006. After her post-doctoral training with Dr. Elaine Fuchs at Rockefeller University form 2007-2012, she started her independent career as a group leader at NIBS Beijing in 2012. Her laboratory is interested in novel mechanisms governing skin regeneration and autoimmune diseases. Dr. Chen’s lab has developed new in vivo gene editing technologies to achieve gene repair in RDEB mouse model, and de novo induction of hair follicles formation using optogenetic tool. Using multidisciplinary methods, her lab has revealed novel mechanisms of niche regulated skin stem cell specification, regeneration and decay; as well as the coding mechanisms of regional skin regeneration and autoimmune disease pattern. 

Kim B. Jensen is Professor and Deputy Director at the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Stem Cell Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Kim Jensen received his training in stem cell biology at the London Research Institute - CRUK and the University of Cambridge, UK. He is interested in the molecular mechanisms that govern stem cell fate specification, and how extracellular signals integrate with gene regulatory networks to control tissue maturation and cellular plasticity in developing and regenerating adult epithelial tissues including the skin and the intestine. By combining studies using mouse models and clinical specimens the long-term aim of the research in the Jensen lab is to translate result from in vitro and in vivo models into regenerative therapies.

Kyogo Kawaguchi received his Ph.D in 2015 from The University of Tokyo, where he studied nonequilibrium physics and biophysics under the supervision of Masaki Sano. As a visiting student at the Institute for Virus Research from 2013 to 2014, he gained experience in experiments in Ryoichiro Kageyama's lab. After completing his Ph.D, Kyogo joined Allon Klein's lab at Harvard Medical School to work on theory and experiments related to stem cell dynamics. Since 2018, he has been a Hakubi Team Leader at RIKEN in Kobe, where his lab conducts research on multicellular dynamics and intracellular condensate formation, utilizing a combination of cell culture experiments, theoretical physics, and machine learning.

Dr. Kurita is a plastic surgeon and a researcher of related field. He graduated from The University of Tokyo in 2003 and began working as a plastic surgeon. He obtained his PhD from the Kyorin University School of Medicine (Professor Kiyonori Harii) in 2010. He worked on the development of a method to reprogram wound-resident mesenchymal cells to epithelial cells to invent new therapy for non-healing skin ulcers and found a set of genes reprogram mesenchymal cells to epithelial cells in 2014. After working as a research associate at Salk Institute for Biological Studies with Professor Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte (2015-2018), he moved to The Department of Plastic Surgery, The University of Tokyo Hospital. He currently focuses on the development of a method for complex tissue regeneration via tissue embryonization as AMED Moonshot project manager.

Karl Koehler, PhD is Assistant Professor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at Harvard Medical School, a Scientist in Otolaryngology & Plastic and Oral Surgery at Boston Children’s Hospital, and Principal Investigator in the F.M. Kirby Neurobiology Center. He founded his lab in 2015, shortly after completing his PhD in Neuroscience in 2014 at Indiana University School of Medicine. Karl’s early work led to a novel culture system for growing mouse and human inner ear organoids, which his lab now uses to model congenital ear disorders, test gene therapies for hearing restoration, and investigate the mechanisms of otic cell regeneration. In addition, his group has shown how this unique multi-lineage organoid model can be used to generate hair-bearing skin tissue. His talk will discuss recent work using single-cell genomics to compare human fetal-organoid skin development and the potential application of skin organoids for reconstructive surgery.

Maksim Plikus is professor of Developmental and Cell Biology. Having finished his PhD and postdoctoral training in skin biology, he started his own research group at the University of California, Irvine in 2012. Broadly, his research interests fall at the intersection of developmental biology, regenerative medicine, evolution and systems biology and to pursue them, he commonly turns to skin as the model system. He is particularly intrigued at trying to understand mechanisms of skin self-organization, limits of cellular plasticity in adult skin upon repair, and genetic drives of evolutionary adaptation of skin to diverse habitats.

Aiko Sada is an Associate Professor at the International Research Center for Medical Sciences (IRCMS), Kumamoto University, Japan. After receiving her Ph.D. in 2011, she worked as a postdoctoral fellow in the Tumbar lab at Cornell University in the U.S., where she started skin stem cell research. She returned to Japan in 2016, worked as an assistant professor at the University of Tsukuba, and started her own laboratory at Kumamoto University in October 2019. Her research focuses on how heterogenous epidermal stem cell populations with different cell division frequencies behave and is regulated in skin regeneration and aging. She is currently studying the regulatory mechanisms of epidermal stem cells by combining cellular and molecular biological techniques, genetic engineering of mice, tissue engineering, omics analysis, and glycobiology.

Fumiko Toyoshima is professor of cell biology at the Institute for Life and Medical Sciences, Kyoto University. She received her undergraduate degree in Agriculture in 1995, and PhD in Science in 2000 both from Kyoto University. After her post-doctoral training with Prof. Eisuke Nishida at Kyoto University on cell cycle regulation, she started her own research group as a PRESTO researcher in 2005 with a project of oriented cell division. In 2008, she joined the Institute for Virus Research at Kyoto University, where her group started works on skin morphogenesis and remodeling. In 2023, she joined Tokyo Medical and Dental University under the cross-appointment system. Her research interest is focused on physiological and pathological organ remodeling and homeostatic medicine.