Publications by authors named "Takafumi Ohtsuka"

Activity-dependent gene regulation in neurons has been hypothesized to be under transcriptional control and to include dramatic increases in immediate early genes (IEGs) after neuronal activity. In addition, several reports have focused on post-transcriptional regulation, which could be mediated by neuronal post-transcriptional regulators, including RNA binding proteins (RNABPs). One such protein family is the neuronal Elavls (nElavls; Elavl2, Elavl3, and Elavl4), whose members are widely expressed in peripheral and central nervous system.

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Prep1, a TALE-family homeodomain transcription factor, has been demonstrated to play a critical role in embryonic hematopoiesis, as its insufficiency caused late embryonic lethality associated with defective hematopoiesis and angiogenesis. In the present study, we generated hematopoietic- and endothelial cell-specific Prep1-deficient mice and demonstrated that expression of Prep1 in the hematopoietic cell compartment is not essential for either embryonic or adult hematopoiesis, although its absence causes significant hematopoietic abnormalities in the adult bone marrow. Loss of Prep1 promotes cell cycling of hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells (HSPC), leading to the expansion of the HSPC pool.

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An increasing number of studies have demonstrated that neural RNA-binding proteins (nRNABPs) participate in several steps of neural development through post-transcriptional regulation of their RNA targets (Grabowski Curr Opin Genet Dev 21:388-394, 2011). Classical genetics and in vitro biochemical approaches have identified several important RNA targets of nRNABPs linked to cell-fate decision and neuronal functions. In recent years, new technologies, such as unbiased in vivo protein-RNA interaction approaches, high-throughput sequencing-cross-linked immunoprecipitation (HITS-CLIP), microarrays, RNAseq and others, have been developed.

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A simple method for determining short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) in rat and human feces was developed using high-performance liquid chromatography with electrochemical detection (HPLC-ECD). A two-channel HPLC-ECD system was fabricated using an ion exclusion column and an electrochemical detector with a glassy carbon working electrode. Aqueous solutions of 0.

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Eimination of a back-reflected TE mode traveling in a TM-mode optical isolator was investigated. The optical isolator had a Mach-Zehnder interferometer that included a polarization-dependent reciprocal phase shifter in one of the arms. The reciprocal phase shift was achieved by an optical path difference between the two arms.

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